Sonic S: The Tale of Tails
by Virtus the Protector
Summary: After the retaking of South Island, Sonic meets a new friend on Westside Island by the name of Tails. Now the two pals must stop Robotnik before he gets his hands on the chaos emeralds once again... But when Tails is kidnapped, what will Sonic do?
1. Prologue

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Prologue**

Virtus slowly and unwillingly opened his eyes.

"_Only five more minutes, mom..."_ The masked man mumbled half-awake, half unaware that his current location was Zonic's headquarters in the No Zone, and not the Sweden of Earth-Alpha.

The masked vigilante quickly remembered that he was still in the No Zone, the zone that connected all universes that the Zone Cop known as Zonic had been watching over to ensure balance for a pretty large chunk of his life. Virtus slowly straightened himself up in the bed, kicking the covers to the side.

------

The human walked down one of the long hallways in Zonic's headquarters. He could easily have made it through every single doorway and corridor in the entire in a matter of seconds, if he had gone at supersonic speed. But with the masked human's lack of control over the sound bangs his speed generated, it wouldn't be the wisest choice with all that, probably rather expensive, equipment present.

And by the way, who would have wanted to miss that impressive view of the space outside the large windows. Not dark and cold like the usual space you saw in those sci-fi movies, but a beautiful mish-mash of all colours in existence. Surely, whoever was the "Great Architect" who designed this universe, was either a total nutcase, or an artistic genius. Either way, it was truly a sight to behold.

Virtus looked at his own reflection in the otherwise transparent glass. The mask didn't reveal much of the mysterious male, just a pair of blue eyes in the middle of the red V that covered the face of the mask.

From the place where his nose was hidden, a red V-mark extended and split across his eyes, reaching over his forehead and all the way around, continuing down his back over his back, then cracking into a pair of smaller Vs that went back over his shoulders with their outer ends to form the red V-mark that spanned over his chest in a symbolic manner.

Speaking of upper bodies, his black costume's arms had a set of V-s that ran from his shoulders to his elbows. The white gloves had a small red V that decorated the outside of his palms.

The black and white full-bodysuit, continued in the same manner with a white belt around the masked hedgehog's waist with another red V-mark in the belt buckle.

Further on, at the outer side of his legs, another V extended from the belt almost to the end of his slightly baggy pant legs. And lastly, his feet rested in a pair of white sneakers with another red V-mark that extended from the back of his shoes to their toe tips.

Putting the major details aside, Virtus suddenly noticed a small flaw in his disguise. Beneath the edge of his mask, a small strand of a brown hair strand peaked out like an irritating root that you usually found in your garden.

Looking from side to side to make sure that there was no one but himself in the corridor, and no cameras present, the masked human lifted an edge of his mask below his chin. He partially pulled his mask off, revealing more and more of a Caucasian-coloured muzzle...

"Enjoying our reflection, are we?" A familiar voice said.

Virtus quickly pulled his mask down again, cursing silently beneath it. He turned around to look upon Zonic with a serious look in his eyes.

"Have you ever thought about just why I go through all this trouble to keep my true identity secret?" Virtus said, with an irritated undertone in his voice.

"Not quite. Why bother with cool outfits when it's what's inside the package that matters?" Zonic remarked.

"Easy for you to say. Your family and friends must be spread out everywhere around this entire dimension, while the few enemies you have are either banished to some prison dimension or who's home world is a few dimensional jumps away. And even if they have the technology to cross the time/space continuum, what chances do they have of locating you without some sort of interdimensional navigator thingamajig. And while I'm at it, you didn't reveal your true identity to Archie... Sorry, Sonic-Prime until you trusted him enough." Virtus exclaimed.

(Author's Note: Sonic Super Special #12, if you didn't know.)

"That's my point. You need to learn to trust others." Zonic said.

"I trust hardly no one but myself. And so did you that time, after all."

"Touché." Zonic replied at Virtus' quick-witted remark about his dimensional counterpart.

"And for your information, I was only removing some clues to my true identity."

"There will be no DNA-profiling on that hair strand." Virtus said, pulled the strand of hair down and threw it, the hair dissolving into nothingness before it touched the ground.

Suddenly, the alarm blared throughout the headquarters, alerting the two individuals of an incoming danger. Deciding that their argument could be settled at a later date, the two heroes ran to the control room of Zonic's base of operations.

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**Author's Notes:** Back again, with the next entry in the Sonic S series, and hopefully I'll get more reviews this time around. But I guess that's the price of basing stories on already existing storylines. This adaption will be a little different than the last one, as there's not even slightest resemblance between the two Sonic 2s. (8-bit and 16-bit.) But I won't spill the beans just yet. It might take some time to get the next chapter up, but good things are worth waiting for, aren't they? Get ready for the introduction of Miles Prower, AKA Tails, Sonic's best friend. Please review, but no flames! By the way, is there anyone that knows the year and month of release of "Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine?" Some sources list the US release date as November 1993, while some list it as February 1993. It's rather important, since it will affect further story development.


	2. Chapter 01: New Friend and An Old Enemy

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 01: ****A New Friend and An Old Enemy**

Westside Island could be considered the twin island to South Island, with its own variety of tourist resorts, such as beautiful beaches, interesting water-filled ruins, sparkling theme parks, high mountains and mysterious dark caves to explore if you was curious. The island was considered so beautiful, that it had gained the nickname of "the Island of Illusion."

A distant sound of a rotor blade hummed throughout the skies of Westside Island, as the sun arose in the horizon. The clouds seemed to part as a red bi-plane with white letters on its sides, both sides forming the word "TORNADO." In the pilot's seat, the uncanny sea of blue quills revealed the pilot's true identity.

On this very day, the blue hedgehog known as Sonic had arrived to obtain the chaos emeralds on Westside Island, sensing that they somehow had hidden themselves on this particular land, seemingly at their own accord.

Nevertheless, with Robotnik outside the coast of South Island, looking for the six chaos emeralds that the doctor thought the blue hedgehog had left at his sinking blimp in desperation as Sonic fled his doom once again, getting the magical gems back would be a lot easier time around.

(Author's Note: Check out "Sonic S: The Beginning" for further details concerning this incident.)

But Sonic was both right and wrong in his assumptions. It wouldn't be as easy as he suspected, but it would not be "seemingly impossible" as last time, thanks to some unforeseen circumstances.

------

Sonic seemed to be a skilled pilot as he landed the biplane with the ease of a professional. The flight vehicle slid to a stop in the beach's sand, sending small clouds of dust in the wake of the tracks of the biplane's wheels.

Sonic jumped out of his plane and touched ground. With his eyes at the jungle before him, the blue hedgehog revved up into a spin.

"_Six chaos emeralds, coming up__!"_

Suddenly, a rumbling sound from within Sonic's stomach alerted him of sudden hunger. He didn't break out of his spin, but his mind switched its target from chaos emeralds to more important matters.

"_But first, some diner."_ Sonic decided, and burst off into the jungle.

------

The trees were luckily filled with many different edible fruits for the blue hedgehog to gulp down in haste. The blue hedgehog simply had to jump into a treetop and either bump into the tree to shake the goods, or he could be creative and jump into his spiky ball form to cut down the fruit at once.

Sonic soon found a nice and cosy tree to rest beneath, while he chomped down a large yellow fruit while some of its red fluid leaked out from his chewing mouth. He wiped the juice of from his lips with the back of his gloved hand and then rested his back against the tree, gazing up towards the sky.

"_Robotnik's probably still poking around at the bottom of the ocean__. And the chaos emeralds are not going anywhere, so why don't I just relax for a few days? After all, I think I've earned myself a vacation."_

As the blue hedgehog leant back against the tree, he was unaware of the pair of eyes watching him with utter curiosity, hidden in the bushes.

-----

The next couple of days, Sonic built himself a small hut at the beach from tree logs and palm leaves, spending the daily hours watching the sky, and the nights sleeping peacefully in the hut without a care in the world.

One particular day, while he was out collecting fruit for lunch, he stumbled upon a slightly odd phenomenon occurred as he bumped his shoulder into the tree to get some food to come down with the pull of gravity. But a mass of fruits fell down slightly quicker than Sonic had expected and bounced of his head. When the assault had subsided, the blue hedgehog rubbed his forehead to dampen the headache, and as he looked on the fruit that had "attacked" his head, he noticed that at least half of the fruits spread out over the ground was half-eatened.

A sudden rustle in the leaves above him alerted the hedgehog that he wasn't alone. He looked up, but there were no more sounds that could give the intruder away. He scratched his head in confusion, but he soon switched to shrugging of the possible theories with his shoulders.

"_Probably just a hungry Flicky."_ Sonic thought.

The blue hedgehog picked up the fruits without chewing marks and dashed back for his hut with his arms full of food for the evening.

-----

That night, with the stomach full of fruit, the blue hedgehog had a nightmare of an extra-large Dr. Robotnik hitting him over the head with a large wrench repeatedly.

When Sonic awoke the following morning, he could've sworn that the clanking still rung in his ears. A few seconds of sleepily blinking eyes later, he suddenly realized that he really WAS hearing the repeating sound.

Sonic went from sleepy to alert in a matter of seconds with his now wide-awake eyes and ears tracing the sound's source to behind his biplane, the Tornado.

-----

When he arrived at the Tornado's location, Sonic found that the noise had ceased upon his arrival, and no one seemed to be there. But a wrench that lie scarcely thrown into the sand, with a trail of footprints leading from it to behind the flight vehicle.

Sonic took slow steps to sneak up on the intruder who was surely hiding behind the biplane. With a quick tilt of his head over the other edge of the plane's nose, he got his first good look at the one who had been making the metallic sounds. The sight surprised him greatly.

There, behind his own red biplane, a small orange fox sat curled up in his own tail, trembling slightly like a little child. Which was exactly what he was as he couldn't possibly be older than the blue hedgehog himself. With only a pair of white gloves and red and white shoes on, he didn't seem to be much of a threat.

That looks could be deceiving was a lesson that Sonic knew by heart.

"Hey, yo!" He exclaimed.

The fox jumped to his feet at the sudden surprise, and turned his gaze towards the blue hedgehog, who was patting his foot against the ground impatiently.

"Kiddo..." Sonic said, moving his head from side to side slowly.

The fox nervously tugged at his own fluffy tail to remove hairs that weren't there while he nervously stroked his foot in a circular motion against the ground.

"Haven't your mom taught you not to play around with other peoples toys?" Sonic said, glaring at the fox like an owner glared at his dog when it had chewed up his favourite pair of shoes.

The fox quit tugging at his tail and put it behind his back, along with his hands in a nervous manner.

"T-there... were some loose screws in the left wing, and a ventilation drum in the engine had melted..." The fox nervously began, but seemed to get more confident as he kept on explaining.

"Hold it." Sonic said, and the fox converted back to his shy nature.

"A kid who knows mechanics?" The hedgehog seemed unconvinced.

"It's true..." The fox replied while crossing his fingers and looking at them to avoid Sonic's gaze.

"Oh really?" Sonic said with a warm smile and walked back to the other side of the biplane, motioning for the fox to follow him.

The fox reluctantly followed the hedgehog behind the flight vehicle and saw Sonic pick up his wrench from the sand, and was suddenly greeted with the hedgehog's hand reaching out against him, offering the fox his tool back.

"Show me." The hedgehog smirked while looking at the fox with anticipation.

The fox looked into Sonic's eyes and then back to the tool he held in his outstretched hand, before grasping the tool in a hand that seemed used to the wrench.

Fifteen minutes later, the plane was in better shape than the first time the young hedgehog had laid his eyes upon it. He pulled the newly oiled lever backwards with relative ease, amazed by the young fox's skills. The blue hedgehog jumped out of the plane, down to the fox that was filled with pride.

"What's your name, kiddo?" Sonic asked.

"Miles Prower." The fox replied.

It was then that Sonic suddenly noticed what would become this fox's most prominent physical feature with wide eyes. As the fox slowly wagged his tail back and forth, it was suddenly clear that it was really two tails he wagged back and forth.

"But my... friends call me Tails."

------

The two new friends spent the rest of the day bonding between each other. The blue hedgehog learned more about the strange mutation that Tails had been born with, giving him an extra tail that led him to being teased by his fellow foxes through his growth, while the fox learned more about Sonic's quest for the magical gems known as the chaos emeralds.

"Is it true that the gems contain unlimited power?" Tails asked curiously.

"More or less. Robotnik was able to power a couple of his bases with just two..." Sonic replied.

"Robotnik?" Tails wondered.

"Mechanical genius with superiority complex. Friends of yours, maybe?" Sonic smirked.

Tails looked slightly dumbfounded.

"Just kidding, Tails." The blue hedgehog reassured his fox-comrade.

Suddenly, the ground violently shook beneath the two friends, almost sweeping them of their feet. A red light shone and bathed everything in hues of the same colour as an enormous explosion was both heard and seen from the other side of the island.

Robotnik had arrived, no doubt about it.

"Speak of the devil." Sonic spoke under his breath, and in the blink of a second he had dashed away towards the explosion.

As the blue hedgehog ran towards another race for the chaos emeralds at sub-sonic speed, his ears picked up a flapping sound from behind him that seemed to come nearer. As he threw a glance over his shoulder, his eyes went wide in surprise.

Tails, the two-tailed fox was spinning his signature tails in the manner of a propeller, effectively flying by his own power, keeping up with the blue blur with minor difficulty.

"You can fly?" The amazed Sonic exclaimed.

"Yes." Tails simply answered in a cheerful manner.

"You're just full of surprises, aren't you?" The blue hedgehog smirked, and together the two newly established allies sped ahead to find the chaos emeralds before the vicious doctor could.

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**Author's Notes: ****"**Here they come to save the day..." Just kidding around. XD

**To N. Harmonik: **There are lots of reasons for someone to look in a mirror...

**To ****NUTCASE71733:** Thanks for the heads-up. There's no doubt now, next entry in the Sonic S will introduce the Freedom Fighters.

Please review, but no flames!


	3. Chapter 02: Emerald Hill

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 02****: Emerald Hill**

(THEME: Emerald Hill Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Ac**__**t I**_

The blue hedgehog and the flying fox entered the race for the chaos emeralds in the most beautiful of Westside Island's zones, the Emerald Hill zone. Somewhat ironic that they would go gem hunting in a zone named after one.

The emerald-green grass, probably the reason for its unique name, reminded Sonic of Green Hill as he sped across the hills with his fox buddy following behind.

Dr. Robotnik had obviously been doing some engineering for his badniks since last time, as the new robot who sat in the top of a tree, a mechanical monkey named Coconuts; almost hit Tails and Sonic with a bomb shaped like its namesake.

The coconut explosive exploded between the two allies, and they scattered to deal with the threat.

Tails ascended and tackled Coconuts down from the palm before he could throw another bomb, and Sonic finished the job by jumping into his trademark ball form and cutting the badnik into pieces with his sharp spikes, relieving the poor animal trapped inside from its power supply duty.

"_So it's back to basics then, Robotnik?"_ The blue hedgehog thought as he watched Tails lift some pieces of metal away from the scrap heap that once was Coconuts, giving the animal the chance to free itself from the remains of its prison.

It was a Wocky, one of Westside Island's more or less own inhabitants, a small monkey creature with cute faces and extreme agility, the later proven as the animal quickly skipped off into the woods. Tails picked up one of the electronic parts to the severely damaged monkey badnik, studying it carefully.

"This is unbelievably advanced technology! That Robotnik really is a genius." The fox commented at the doctor's mechanical greatness, practically worshiping the mad scientist's torture device-like robot.

"How did I ever manage without you, Tails?" Sonic sarcastically, yet proudly said as he rubbed his hands together to dust them off.

The orange fox flushed slightly pink at the remark as he and Sonic made it to a shaking wooden bridge that spanned over a gap between two platforms.

"Sonic, look out!" Tails suddenly burst out, alerting the blue hedgehog just in time to avoid a pair of new piranha bots that jumped out of the water beneath the bridge, this model known as Mashers.

Tails showed one of the fish badniks off by swinging one of his tails like a whip, effectively disorienting it and taking it out of action. Sonic simply kicked the remaining mean fishes of the bridge, keeping a steady pace forward.

"Heads up, Tails!" Sonic warned his airborne comrade, as another new badnik, the new, sleeker versions of Buzzbombers known as Buzzers, launched an aerial assault at the two fighters. The wasp robots were no match for the likes of Sonic and Tails, which the proved by leaving a swarm of recently freed Flickies in their trail.

"Great! Now we can concentrate on getting some rings." Sonic triumphantly exclaimed.

"More rings?" Tails asked.

"Don't we already have enough rings to protect ourselves?"

"You'll see." Sonic replied with a smirk on his lips.

_**Act II**_

"INTRUDER-ALERT-MASTER-ROBOTNIK. IDENTIFICATION:..." The Buzzer alerted his master, Dr. Robotnik himself.

"Don't say it!"

"SONIC-THE-HEDGEHOG-AND-UNKNOWN-FOX."

"Not really what I excepted, but still!"

"I've almost emptied half of the sea around South Island in search for the chaos emeralds the hedgehog stole from me, and when I've finally tracked them to this next island, that blue pest just happens to be here too?"

The furious doctor grabbed the Buzzer around the neck, and if the wasp robot had been equipped with lungs, it would probably suffocate right now.

"Tell me something I don't already know!" Robotnik snarled and threw the Buzzer away.

The scientist's next action was to activate a button in his rounded aircraft. A number of mechanisms were triggered, which resulted in a spinning stick that erupted vertically from the back of the vehicle, with two rotor blades extending in an outward position.

The propeller started spinning rapidly, and as soon as the flight vehicle hovered a few feet over the ground, Robotnik activated another button, and a jet engine erupted at the aircraft's backside to drive it forward at full speed towards the location where the hedgehog and fox had last been sighted by his badniks.

------

Sonic and Tails arrived at the end of the Emerald Hill, with a green chaos emerald in the young fox's hands. Tails studied the magical gem carefully, his fingers caressing the perfectly emerald-shaped object with a surgeon's careful hands.

"So the legends are true..." The fox spoke, still getting used to the fact that he was holding a source of immense power.

Tails lifted his gaze to Sonic with a curious look on his fox face.

"Is this really as powerful as they say?"

"Maybe." The blue hedgehog replied.

The only true display of power Sonic had witnessed was his own small bursts of strength and speed thanks to the emeralds and Robotnik's attempts to convert his badnik-manned factories into fully automatic chaos emerald empowered ones.

In all modesty, both Robotnik and Sonic had yet to see the true limits of the mysterious gems.

Speak of the devil as Sonic saw a familiar aircraft descend from the sky, and the unmistakable face of Dr. Robotnik was clearly visible behind the windshield, looking back into the young hedgehog's eyes.

Tails was left out of the staring contest as he stuffed the chaos emerald between his tails to hide it from the doctor.

"That won't do any good, fox. My chaos emerald radar isn't as easy to trick as my eyes." Robotnik exclaimed and pressed a button on his control panel.

A distant roar of engines was heard, followed by a rustle in the treetops that made Flickies flee in panic. The treetops shook slightly and suddenly sunk down into the rest of the forest, with the thumps of logs hitting the ground.

And in a matter of seconds, all chaos and mayhem broke loose.

From the forest, a four-wheeled platform-like vehicle trashed down the last two trees in its path, and headed straight for the two friends.

Sonic pushed himself and Tails to the side and the two friends barely avoided getting tire tracks all over their chests.

Guided by the signal from its master's remote control, the platform had slid to a halt beneath Robotnik's aircraft, and the doctor was already installing the aircraft into his land-based set of wheels. A few locks clicked, merging the two halves together, so that the doctor was all set to go. An enormous drill extended itself from the front of the car/plane, spinning menacingly and threatening to dig a hole into any miserable torso that got in its way.

Sonic looked at the rather impressive vehicle, but still only managed a yawn. A land-based vehicle didn't stand a chance against his Sonic's new Spin Dash manoeuvre he wanted to try out, even less with a flying fox on the blue hedgehog's side.

--------

Foiled again, Robotnik retreated and cast mean glares over his shoulder at the hedgehog and his fox friend exchanged a high five as they cracked one of the prison pods for his organic batteries. As if one persistent animal wasn't enough, now he had two at his tail!

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**Author's Notes:**Was it Jurassic Park or King Kong that came up with that shaking treetops theme? Never mind that, just curiosity. By the way, good news for you all. Thanks to the help of NUTCASE71733 Once this entry is finished, there will be a... drum roll please... adaption of the first three issues of the Mini-Sonic series that preceded the series we all love... Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog.

**To ****NUTCASE71733: **Once again, thank you! And concerning Tails' IQ, I was myself proportionally smarter back when I was his age, due to my first thirst for knowledge. But all that slipped away when I got my first useless Math test... (Hates Math by now.)

**To N. Harmonik: **Amen to that, brother! (Or sister?)

**To Blue Mage Quartet: **Yes, since the 8-bit version came out first.


	4. Chapter 03: Chemical Plant

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 03****: Chemical Plant**

(THEME: Chemical Plant Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Ac**__**t I**_

The recently started fraction of Robotnik's badnikmaking industries was nothing but a vast array of conveyor belts and tanks filled with strange chemical compounds. Nevertheless, it was somewhere in this fully automated factory that the next chaos emerald was hidden.

Sonic and Tails ran and flew down the blue slopes respectively, holding onto their golden rings for protection against any unforeseen badnik attacks.

A pair of pretty compact circle-shaped robots called Spineys appeared ahead of the duo, with leechlike mechanical mouths on top of their heads to either chews the two animals into bits or shot flashing projectiles. But instead, it was the poor badniks that were smashed to bits by the two friends.

When the two robots had been taken care off, Sonic and Tails were suddenly faced with a dilemma, as they suddenly found themselves without any possible route ahead. Tails flew up to the ceiling and looked for aerial exits, while Sonic stayed on the ground and looked for secret trap doors. The fox soon returned, and he apparently hadn't found anything of value.

But Sonic had, as he ripped open a ventilation shaft in the floor and jumped in, with Tails following closely behind the blue hedgehog.

-------

The hedgehog and the fox exited the air ventilation faster than they had entered it a few hundred meters ahead, with a thick dark blue liquid streamed out behind them from the shaft, apparently not the water you should fill your fill your bath tub with.

Sonic released his hand from Tails and dragged his feet across the metal floor to smudge off the blue substance off his sneakers, and Tails whirled his tails in a dog-like manner to splatter off the stains in them.

As soon as they had decided what were blue chemicals and not Sonic's naturally blue quills, (the difference being that Sonic yelped for every quill pulled out, while he remained silent when it was just another liquid stain) the two allies headed deeper into Robotnik's factory.

_**Act II**_

"Sonic, help!" Tails shout as a strange combination of a spider robot with stripes of a wasp had grasped him in its long thin legs and pulled him into the air, trying to pry the duo's recently claimed chaos emerald.

But Sonic was of course there to release his fox buddy from the malicious badnik's grip, cracking it open like a tin can and releasing a terrified Locky, an eagle-like bird, from its power supplying duty. Tails jumped down from the severed spider-robot with the purple gem tightly locked in his grip, thankful that he had made friends with this blue fighting machine of a hedgehog.

The two friends soon found another, drier, pipe to enter, hoping that they could exit the factory without any more interruptions.

-----

Sonic and Tails ran down a slope, barely a few meters over the surface of a purple liquid that filled the gigantic room like a glass slowly being filled with some oddly coloured children soda pop.

The chemicals soon reached them to their ankles, but neither seemed so worried about the possibility of drowning. Sonic lifted his gaze to Tails as he flew beside him, and his lips curled into a smirk.

"You know what, Tails?" The blue hedgehog said.

"What, Sonic?" Tails wondered.

Sonic opened his mouth to give an explanation, but he suddenly shut it, biting his lower lip slightly, almost as if he was afraid of ever opening it again. Should he say that it was nothing, or would he dare spilling the beans about...

"I never learned how to swim."

There. He said it.

Tails seemed slightly taken back by the sudden revelation, and directed his gaze forwards. Slowly, but steadily, a giggle spread out by itself in his muzzle showing Sonic that the hero-worshiping respect the fox once had for him, now was reduced to a mere friend's respect.

"Should have kept my mouth shut." Sonic thought, his upside-down smirk reflecting his feelings perfectly.

The liquid now reached Sonic to the waist, while Tails floated above the chemical compound, and offered his extended hand to the blue hedgehog.

Sonic grabbed it with a little bit of reluctance, and was immediately scooped up from the water in utter surprise at the strength in Tails' appendages.

"Maybe spilling your water secrets to your friends isn't such a bad thing. Blood is thicker than water, after all." With those and many other puns in his head, the hedgehog and his fox pal made it for an aerial escape.

-----

The two friends found themselves at a platform in a sea of the chemicals, and true to his nature, when all traps failed; Robotnik arrived in his aircraft to deal with the threat personally. With a strange contraption that looked like a glass jar for containing liquids. A hose extended itself from the underside of the vehicle and sunk itself into the purple liquid.

The doctor chuckled and pressed a button to activate the suction in the pump connected to the hose, and a liquid noise slurped throughout the room.

However, while Robotnik prepared another devastating weapon, it left him open to the kicks and punches of Sonic and Tails. The doctor snarled and pulled the hose out of the discoloured sea of chemicals, and reversed the flow of the pump, going from suction to blow in seconds. The chemicals splattered across the platform in thick waves, but what did some slippery floors matter to a pair of fighters of which one could fly even with the other weighing him down.

A matter the doctor became aware of as Sonic jumped into the air and grabbed a hold of his fox friend's hand. Tails threw the blue hedgehog against the aircraft and Sonic delivered the final blow to the flight vehicle's cabin.

After some silent cursing, the doctor retreated from the scene, leaving Sonic and Tails to find their way out without disturbances.

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**Author's Notes: **Boring! This chapter was a real pain in the... You get the point.

**To N. Harmonik and ****NUTCASE71733: **Super Sonic will debut in the midlogue (about 10-11 chapters from now) and make both Sonic and Robotnik realize the true potential of the chaos emeralds.


	5. Chapter 04: Aquatic Ruin

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 04****: Aquatic Ruin**

(THEME: Aquatic Ruin Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Ac**__**t I**_

The beautiful ancient crumbled buildings, partially sunken into water, were still an astounding sight to Tails who knew almost as much as an encyclopaedia about the place, while Sonic simply cursed something about "underwater ruins..." to the sight.

(Author's Note: Apparently, Sonic still has something against underwater ruins. Check Sonic S: The Beginning for the reason.)

But the two friends shook the view of, concentrating at the main task at hand and ran into the Aquatic Ruin Zone. Suddenly, a pillar burst up from the ground, standing in their way. Sonic screeched to a slower pace and simply ran around the stone column, while Tails ascended and flew over it.

"Seems like Robotnik's already here." Sonic remarked, strengthening his suspicions as more of the scientist's traps masqueraded as parts of the ancient ruins activated upon the two allies arrival.

The real proof came when Grounders, updated versions of Burrobot, showed their ugly drill-nosed faces and attacked the duo, ripping apart a log that blocked their path to get their drills on the speedy hedgehog and the flying fox.

The red digging robots where soon disposed off, but they were fast enough to activate the surrounding security systems before their organic batteries were pulled out forcefully.

Tails was the first to realize that the totem poles that depicted humanoid faces weren't just decorations to amaze the tourists, as their mouths opened and shot wide arrays of arrows after the two pals. Sonic grabbed a hold of Tails wrist and pulled him out of danger as the arrows whooshed through the air just inches above their heads.

The kept moving forward, and were soon out of the pillars shooting range, where they faced another, less impressive set of badniks.

The Whisps, small flying bug robots that didn't seem to pose any real threat dove for the hedgehog and the fox and proved their presumed threat level as the two fighters easily beat them and they made their way into the inner bowels of the Aquatic Ruin Zone.

------

Below water surface level, the two friends were slightly slowed down by the liquid, and ran, or more like swam, into a new fish robot.

Chop-Chop might have had a pretty impressive set of jaws, but as the rest of its small body indicated, it was not properly prepared for an underwater fight with the blue hedgehog and his fox sidekick.

-------

After a vast amount of not so big challenges in badniks, a widely spread out cluster of rings and one Star Post, Sonic and Tails found themselves with the third chaos emerald, shining brightly in its cyan colour in the blue hedgehog's hand as he hid it in the sea of quills on his back.

Suddenly, a mass of bricks flew through the air, barely missing the two allies and hitting the ground. The hedgehog and the fox looked to their side against the source, a Grounder that had broken through a whole wall to be the one that would put the hedgehog and the fox away for good, and gaining the promotion that would make every other badnik green with envy.

But Sonic and Tails simply looked at each other indifferently, thinking the same thought.

This badnik was one double Spin Dash from the trash heap.

_**Act II**_

The next section of the Aquatic Ruin was somewhat trickier, when they realized that Robotnik hadn't bothered putting out traps because the ancient architecture had begun to crumble by the force of time and was a perfect death trap already. The fox and the hedgehog had to hold on tight to the three emeralds as they jumped, or in Tails' case flew, over platforms that fell apart as soon as they touched their surface.

Thanks to Sonic's speed and Tails flight, the two friends made it to the end of the ruins with relative ease, but their work wasn't done yet.

A set of pillars erupted from the ground, surrounding the two combatants with the totem pole engrave heads aiming for them with their arrow-shooting mouths, yet holding their fire.

There was no doubt about who was sitting at the controls, as the well known round aircraft cast its shadow over the hedgehog and the fox, and the gleeful doctor showed his ugly face.

"Surrender the chaos emeralds or I'll turn both of you into pin cushions!" Robotnik's voice thundered throughout the ring of killer totem poles.

When neither Sonic nor Tails moved a muscle, the doctor answered their ignorance by pressing a button that made the eyes on the faces engraved in the totem poles glow red.

The hedgehog and the fox knew what to come and jumped into the air just as a wide array of arrows were released, threatening to put fatal injury on their fragile bodies, but instead lodged themselves in the totem poles located opposite of the ones that had released them.

Tails simply flew upwards to attack the doctor head on, while Sonic found incredible sensation in using the arrows lodged into the pillars as temporary stair steps, quickly working his way up towards the doctor.

Robotnik, busy avoiding Tails' kicks and punches above, didn't see any of the hedgehog's actions and only managed to catch a glimpse of what happened next.

Sonic extended his leg in a kicking pose, ready to deal some serious damage to the doctor's aircraft, when something unexplainable happened.

Time seemed to freeze as Sonic suddenly burst into a glow of yellow light that barely allowed his normal blue colour maintain itself beneath the yellow flames. As if the sudden power burst wasn't enough, Sonic's black eyes glowed green as his foot connected with the flight vehicle's cargo.

Robotnik had an expression of utter shock upon his face as he yet again was sent into the sky as a small dot spinning out of control by the force of an unusually powerful kick from the blue little pest.

"Impossibleeeeeeee...!" Robotnik screamed a top of his lungs, mirroring the first incident almost perfectly.

(Author's Note: Remember the Marble Zone incident in Sonic S: The Beginning)

Tails stared after the doctor as he made his sudden farewell, and turned back to Sonic as soon as Robotnik was gone. The yellow flaming aura shrunk until it was completely gone from the blue hedgehog's body, and as he opened his eyes once again, the pupils had turned back to their usual black colour.

Both friends looked at the cyan emerald in Sonic's hand as he pulled the gem out from beneath his quills to examine it further, amazed at this sudden burst of strength.

Was it possible that the power of the chaos emeralds could empower BOTH organic beings and machines?

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**Author's Notes: **Due to popular demand, a small taste of things to come.

**To ****NUTCASE71733:** Three emeralds down.

**To N. Harmonik: **I didn't know that those chemical compounds had a name.

**To Blue Mage Quartet: **Grabber Man, Grabber man, does whatever arachnoids can. Catches prey, any size. Foxes, hedgehogs, even flies. XD Sorry, silly joke.

**To Manavie:** Thanks for adding my story to your Story Alert list.


	6. Chapter 05: Casino Night

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 05****: Casino Night**

(THEME: Casino Night Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Ac**__**t I**_

The glitzy gambling city of the Casino Night Zone was what you could call a twin city to the Spring Yard Zone.

(Author's Note: Check Sonic S: The Beginning for that particular zone.)

This town that used to be an entertainment paradise for the inhabitants of Westside Island was now just another of those areas that gave positive readings on Robotnik's chaos emerald radars. And as a consequence, the doctor's badniks were now patrolling the giant pinball tables and the other oversized casino attractions, turning anyone who wasn't a robot into organic batteries.

Of course, this hadn't gone unnoticed by the likes of Sonic and Tails, and the magical gem-collecting duo made their way into the sparkly city.

Following the large signs that spelled "CASINO", the two friends wouldn't have any problems collecting enough rings for whatever reason they had.

-----

The only major threat in the zone was a new badnik by the name of Crawl, probably because it was so compact that it had to crawl forwards with its apparent lack of long legs. However, its armour didn't seem to be as useless as it protected the robot from all frontal attacks, and covered the weak spots with its star-spangled shield. The badnik also proved quite a nuisance as it had a spear to make holes in any persecutors that blocked his path.

It was Tails who came up with the idea of distracting the robot by floating in front of it and making mocking grimaces by sticking out his tongue and rolling his eyes at the badnik. The teasing seemed to take its effect and the badnik fiercely tried to hit the flying fox with its weapon.

And left its unshielded backside open for Sonic's Spin Dash, as it realized when it saw the blue spiky ball burst out from its torso, with the animal that once had been Crawls power source clutched in his hedgehog hands.

_**Act II**_

Sonic and Tails made their way to end of the Casino Night Zone, after having bounced numerous catapulting devices such as springs and bumpers, entered dozens of giant pinball tables and millions of bingo slots that seemed to give a few hundred rings away upon the right combination, with the fourth red chaos emerald, accompanying the three other ones in their possession.

The stage was set for Robotnik to make his entrance with another ridiculous mechanical weapon to steal the emeralds from their keepers.

-----

Dr. Robotnik wasn't prepared for such an assault at this time in his plans, but with his technical genius, it was a piece of cake adding a grenade launcher to his trademark aircraft. Whatever had happened in the Aquatic Ruin, the pesky blue little pest Sonic had with some random trick managed to deal a tremendous amount of damage to his beloved airborne creation.

In a blur of hammers, screwdrivers and oil cans, the doctor seemed to become nothing but a swipe of three to five different scientists, each doing a different repair procedure on their aircraft.

The doctor wiped some sweat off from his forehead and then jumped into the flight vehicle, pushed a few buttons in a sequence the doctor had programmed himself, upon which the engines gave away a loud humming sound before the thrusters ignited, lifting the aircraft into the air.

"_Time to settle a score."_

And with a sudden burst in flames from the jet thrusters, Robotnik was away to fight the hedgehog once more.

------

With almost strategic timing, the doctor arrived inside the largest one of the giant pinball machines, attracting the attention of Sonic and Tails, who just had exited an elevator at the highest floor, the very same floor that had Robotnik and his flight vehicle waiting inside. The duo was a bit reluctant to enter another one of the attractions, especially with the doctor as a special surprise jackpot.

But of course, there was the satisfaction of rubbing the fact that they had gotten the chaos emerald before him once again into the doctor's face...

------

So here they were, learning the hard way that Robotnik had learned at least something after all his defeats at the hands of Sonic, as the doctor activated a shield of electric energy that hindered the two fighters from attacking it simply by jumping into the air and turning their bodies into deadly weapons that could dent the aircraft's armour.

But Sonic still had a trick up his non-existent sleeve and whispered it into Tails' ear. The fox nodded in reply, and began swirling his tails to take flight and draw the attention of Robotnik away from his blue hedgehog friend, who needed time to prepare a Spin Dash specially designed for the doctor.

Tails stuck out his tongue and mocked the doctor by making a wet, farting sound with his lips while he was at it.

Robotnik snarled and pushed a button that made two large extendable yellow claws appear on each side of the aircraft, trying to grab the fox as he manoeuvred from right to left in the air. When its advances didn't prevail, the doctor resorted to dropping spiky red mines from his aircraft to blow the cocky fox into pieces.

It was getting a bit too intense for Tails, and he sure hoped that Sonic could put his plan (and body) in motion soon.

Robotnik could see that the irritating fox was getting desperate. It would only be a matter of time before the fox and the hedgehog were nothing but... Wait a minute.

Where was the hedgehog?

In his triumph at putting the fox in a tight spot, the doctor had completely forgot about the hedgehog.

By looking up, Robotnik got the answer in the form of:

"Bomb's away!" Sonic's voice erupted as the familiar blue spiky ball dropped from the air and slammed into the aircraft's cargo, putting all defence and weapon systems out of function.

To late, Robotnik had realized to late that while the fox had distracted him, Sonic had spun his way to the top of the pinball table to make a surprise drop on him.

With only the manoeuvring system online, Robotnik had no other choice but to make a hasty retreat while he still could.

Sonic touched ground and was soon accompanied by Tails as he dusted off his gloves, smirking after Robotnik as he fled.

"Game Over, Robotnik."

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**Author's Notes: **How do I manage to make it at least 1000+ words every chapter? Guess I should see it as a gift. Alright, look at all the new faces!

**To NUTCASE71733:**Sorry, no poker dealings yet. XD

**To Snake15000: **Four zones of chaos emeralds, that is. Thanks for the favourite and story alert by the way.

**To N. Harmonik: **Guess I couldn't fit an explanation for the Star Posts in the story. Possibly out of fatigue.

**To**** Ken Wise: **Thanks for the Story Alert

**To K Twenty Two: **Thanks for the favourite.


	7. Chapter 06: Hill Top Zone

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 06****: Hill Top**

(THEME: Hill Top Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Ac**__**t I**_

The mountain of Westside Island was really nothing more but a hill. A very, very high hill.

Thereof the name Hill Top Zone, and not Mountain Top Zone.

Lately, there had been lots of seismic activity going on in the zone, turning the hills into small volcanoes that seemed to switch place with each other as the ground shook and the landscape reshaped itself.

It wasn't very wise to enter the Hill Top Zone at these dangerous times, even for Robotnik in his search for the chaos emeralds. Guess that you get a little cock-headed when you have hundreds of badniks to take all the risks.

Unlike the two friends Sonic and Tails, who had to risk both life and limb to get to the powerful magical gems before the villainous doctor could get his hands on them and rule the world as he saw fit.

-----

As the dynamical duo took a lift to transport themselves over a wide gap that lay across the zone, the ground shook once more, making the lift rock back and forth in the air, taking the hedgehog and the fox by surprise.

Tails took flight and caught Sonic's hands in the air as the blue hedgehog jumped off, seconds before the lifts creaked one last time before the wires that suspended it in the air gave away and the whole construction fell.

With the distant rumbling of metal that hit rock bottom ringing in their ears, the two pals moved on, shrugging what could have spelt doom, at least for Sonic, off their shoulders.

-----

The first new encounter of Robotnik's badnik army was the very unimpressive Spike Top, a small, seemingly useless drill-headed robot that rolled back and forth on the area it had been programmed to patrol in case any intruders tried to make their way into the Hill top Zone.

Its actions were futile, as the only weapon it had, also its only defence, was simply used as a pointy projectile against the two mammals, whom to the badniks surprise, weren't stupid enough to just stand still and get hit like the puppets it had been training its aim on.

-----

The duo had to jump or alternatively fly over wide gaps filled with lava and break massive boulders that blocked their path to proceed. To add to the experience, there were a newly introduced badnik brand called Rexxons floating in the boiling molten rock, thanks to a special alloy unharmed by the heat, with their wobbling heads swaying back and forth, spitting fireballs with the flamethrowers located between their jaws. Despite their impressive size, the plesiosaur-like robots were no match for a hedgehog with a flying fox on his side.

But they found some fun in using the mechanical teeter-totter-like devices that Robotnik seemed to put up just about everywhere when there were chaos emeralds in the vicinity.

(Author's Note: Remember the Bridge Zone and Star Light Zone from the last entry, Sonic S: The Beginning?)

After breaking though a brick wall with their respective Spin Dashes, the two friends made it into some caves inside of the Hill Top Zone, sensing that the chaos emerald was close.

Sonic suddenly grabbed Tails' wrist and dragged the surprised fox forward, stomping his rapid hedgehog feet like madly.

Upon being unable to gain back his footing as he flapped behind the hedgehog like a flag in the wind, Tails eyes caught what Sonic had discovered first.

A horde of Spike Tops, suspended upside-down in the ceiling of the cave above them, had released a shower of drills from their heads that sunk themselves into the floor after the accelerating hedgehog and fox, but still too slow to get a good hit on them.

Leaving behind a cloud of dust and the stench of burned rubber to taint the artificial smell sensors of the baniks, the two friends were both out of danger and reach.

Or so they thought, as the ground shook with violent force, indicating a new earthquake.

Suddenly, the seismic waves affected the cave in Robotnik's favour, as the floor, ceiling, even the walls came closer.

"Hurry, Sonic!" Tails shout, as the earthquake threatened to squish them into a hedgehog pancake with fox jam on top.

Sonic didn't listen, since he probably already knew what the fox was shouting, as they saw the light at the end of the tunnel getting closer, but still getting smaller and smaller...

------

The blue spiky ball burst out from the small hole, using his razor sharp quills to make the hole big enough for himself and Tails, bouncing a few times before reverting back to Sonic's usual hedgehog form, covered in dirt.

Tails brushed out his own dirt stains from his fluffy pair of tails, whirling them slightly to get the last pieces of dust off.

Sonic simply spin dashed a little, and back at his feet he was clean once again.

"That was a close call." Sonic commented.

Tails simply tapped his feet in a manner patented by Sonic himself, flashed a curved smile identical to the triumphant one that sometimes appeared in the hedgehog's muzzle.

"A close call? More like a close **wall**!" Tails joked.

Sonic didn't give any smirks in return at the pathetic pun, but turned around to hide a smile that was more out of fascination over the fox. He had just faced imminent danger, but not a single trace of panic had appeared. Pretty impressive for someone who wasn't as used to danger as Sonic by now.

"_Just like the baby brother I never had."_

_**Act II**_

With the newest addition to their magical gem collection, the yellow chaos emerald, the two adventurers was hindered by a somewhat new badnik that blocked their way out of the Hill Top Zone.

Sol was an upgrade of Robotnik's Orbinaut design, but rather than throwing the spiked orbs that circled the robot model's sphere-shaped body, this one had a flaming aura that surrounded all its parts, including the sphere projectiles.

(Author's Note: Sounds familiar? Read about the first version of Orbinaut in the Labyrinth Zone in Sonic S: The Beginning.)

Sol released its flaming projectiles in true Orbinaut fashion, but thanks to some team work involving a temporary fan consisting of two rapidly spinning fox tails cooling down the badnik just enough for Sonic to trim his spikes on the badnik's now defenceless metal surface...

------

A few seconds later, all that was left of Sol was a heap of scrap metal and a small animal running back into the forest.

As the last badnik destroyed in the Hill Top Zone, Sol's defeat signalled the entrance of Dr. Robotnik on the battlefield.

The villainous doctor descended in a new vehicle, similar to an earlier one that he had used in the Marble Zone on South Island, in one of his many fights with Sonic in their last race for the chaos emeralds.

(Author's Note: Check out the battle in detail in Sonic S: The Beginning yet again.)

A weapon pipe extended from the magma vehicle, and by its first burst, the hedgehog and the fox became aware that it was a flamethrower that could put the entire zone in flames.

However, the two animals that almost had become a hedgehog pancake with fox jam on top still weren't in any fatal danger of becoming a fried hedgehog pancake with scourged fox jam on top.

A fact that the doctor became aware of as he realized the critical flaw in his mechanical creation, watching the monitors inside of the cockpit bleep red.

There weren't any magma suspended in the air to fuel the flamethrower.

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**Author's Notes:**A little on the late side. Sorry for that, but school affects everyone.

**To Snake15000: **Yeah, he's a little "cracked up" at the moment. Sorry for the terrible pun.

**To N. Harmonik: **Nah, personally I prefer the "Chemical Plant" tune.

**To NUTCASE71733:**It's a tough game world...

Please review, but no flames!


	8. Chapter 07: Mystic Cave

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 07****: Mystic Cave**

(THEME: Mystic Cave Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Ac**__**t I**_

After having trashed Robotnik's lava vehicle in the Hill Top Zone, while the doctor himself got away once again in an escape pod in case of a quick retreat route being needed, the hedgehog and the fox now explored the deeper bowels of the underground caves beneath it, entering the dark tunnels that had gotten a name that suited with the mysterious rumours that had circled around this strange passage.

The Mystic Cave Zone.

-----

The caves were as dark as the rumours described, but there were hundreds of lanterns breaking the darkness, possibly set up by Robotnik's badnik troops to guide the doctor into these caves where the sixth and final chaos emerald was either buried, camouflaged or otherwise hidden, ready to be uncovered either by the evil doctor, or the two friends Sonic and Tails.

Contrary to the belief that plant organisms wouldn't exactly prosper in such a harsh environment without sunlight, the caves' walls, floor and ceiling did indeed have lush greenery, or more like lush "purplery" that showed little if any rocky surfaces beneath the strangely coloured leaves.

Just another advantage for Robotnik's next badnik surprise.

Crawler, a blue digging worm-like robot, suddenly burst out from the ground beneath Sonic's feet as he ran over it, tackling the blue hedgehog in the stomach, which caused Sonic to let out a surprised huff of air, and dropping all the rings in the process.

The force of the robot's attack caught Sonic off guard, and the blue hedgehog was thrown backwards, with no time to avoid Crawler's next attack, deadly this time, extending long knives sticking out from its metallic jaws...

Instead, Tails did it for him, grabbing a hold of the blue hedgehog's foot, and before Sonic could object, the airborne fox had swiped the hedgehog out of the way of Crawler's death strike, and was now getting carried through the air, dangling from the fox's grip by his leg until his head had cleared enough for him to give some payback to the worm robot chasing after the flying duo.

As Tails let go of Sonic's foot, the blue hedgehog, rather than curling into his deadly spike ball manoeuvre, simply landed on Crawler's back, to the badnik's uttermost surprise. A quick, swift move of his hand the hedgehog pulled a vine loose from the ceiling, and then threw it in a lasso-like manner around the robot's mechanical neck, pulling hard to get control over the badnik with his improvised cowboy manner. The oversized mechanical worm tossed and twirled to regain control over the situation, but Sonic's heels dug themselves into the sides of Crawler, keeping the blue hedgehog in balance.

A few minutes of worm rodeo later, Sonic proved victorious as the Crawler quit struggling and obeyed its new master, going from wild fight to slow crawl.

Sonic looked up at Tails, who was clearly impressed by the blue hedgehog's skill at taming tricks, and motioned for him to take a seat behind him at the Crawler's back. Reluctantly, Tails lowered himself onto the badniks body.

With a sharp whistle and a tug at the vine, the "cowhog" and his trusty sidekick rode deeper into the caves, determined to find the last chaos emerald.

-----

The two comrades and their reluctant carrier made some great progress with the badniks newly drawn and downloaded maps of the caves, so they didn't have to "fumble in the dark" as long as they had the badnik under their control.

Their luck was short-lived, however, as a sudden flash startled Sonic, causing him to let go of the vine that kept the Crawler at bay. Seeing its chance, the robotic worm seized the opportunity and freed itself from the two mammals' control, tossing Sonic and Tails of its back, and before they could do anything, it dug itself into the ground to freedom.

With their pet having left them, the two friends quickly got to their feet, puzzled about what had caused the light phenomenon. Tails suddenly grabbed a hold of Sonic's arm, whispering silently in his ear.

"Do you hear buzzing?"

Sonic sharpened his ears, and there it was, the humming sound that Tails had heard.

"Stay back." Sonic said and threw himself out into the darkness, leaving the startled fox behind.

A few sparks of light and the sound of metal cracking, Sonic returned, carrying what looked like a mechanical thorax with a light bulb sticking out of its rear end, which showed a bright light to guide them through the dark tunnels safely.

"Flashers." Sonic said, juggling the piece from one of Robotnik's other insect based robots in his hand.

"Go figure."

_**Act II**_

With the blue chaos emerald in their possession, the two adventures felt that their quest was finally coming to an end, as they now had all six chaos emeralds to keep away from the doctor. Now all they had to do was to find a safe way out of the Mystic Cave Zone, without any unforeseen circumstances.

Of course, Dr. Robotnik wouldn't allow all six emeralds to slip out of his grip yet again, as an earthquake shook the tunnel that Sonic and Tails ran through, sending down rocks and stalagmites just before the doctor burst out off the ground for a final showdown.

(Author's Notes: Sonic snatched all chaos emeralds last time too, in Sonic S: The Beginning.)

In a drilling vehicle, specifically designed to retrieve the chaos emerald from the deep bowels of the Mystic Cave Zone, Robotnik attacked the two friends a last desperate ditch to claim the chaos emeralds.

Desperation, was truly the description that suited the situation, as the doctor had nothing but a pair of giant drills to use as weaponry, and after drilling his way to some unreachable place for the two rascals, to perform automatic repairs after critical hits dealt by same two, it was just a matter of one hit if he would win or lose.

Sonic got the honours.

------

The doctor watched after the hedgehog and the fox as they ran way from him and his severed vehicle and slammed his fist into the ground in anger and disbelief. He had failed yet again, and because of what? Because of a speedy blue hedgehog and a mutant flying fox!?

Suddenly, a computerized voice from the cockpit interrupted his thoughts, with news that immediately made his face light up in newfound hope for his world-conquering plans.

"ENERGY-READING-MATCH-FOUND-IN-OIL-OCEAN-ZONE."

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**Author's Notes:**It couldn't end now, could it? There's still one emerald left.

**To N. Harmonik: **Mmm... Pancakes...

**To ****NUTCASE71733: **You got that right.

**To Snake15000: **For Robotnik's condition, there's no cure but a prison sentence.


	9. Chapter 08: Oil Ocean

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 07****: Oil Ocean**

"A seventh emerald!?" Sonic exclaimed, staring at Tails as the fox just had spilled the bean's about the new chaos emerald that Robotnik had tracked to the Oil Ocean Zone, the very place where he got the lubricants to make the mechanisms in his creations run smoother against each other.

Tails simply nodded, confirming that the would-be ruler of Mobius, and possibly the entire universe, still had at least one magical gem to help him achieve his goal within his reach.

The blue hedgehog silently cursed to himself and pulled out one of the chaos emeralds from his hiding place between his quills, the green one he once had found in the Green Hill Zone on South Island and later recovered in the Emerald Hill on this Westside Island. It was the first emerald he had come in contact with, and as he gazed into the green glowing gem, he felt his duty as a hero to find ALL emeralds before the doctor could use them for evil, no matter if there were seven, eight or possibly hundreds out there.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Sonic said, spun around and grabbed Tails wrist.

The speedy hedgehog then picked up speed for every step he took, until he could let go of Tails and give the fox a flying start with his spinning twin tails.

"Next stop: Oil Ocean!"

-----

(THEME: Oil Ocean Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Ac**__**t I**_

The recently established building block in the all-natural phenomenon of the Oil Ocean, the oil extraction plant for Robotnik's robots, would have been a death trap for the staff. That's if the doctor had organic workers that couldn't be repaired or replaced like the badniks, but since that wasn't the case, the only ones in risk of peril was the two newly arrived adventurers of Sonic and Tails.

-----

The oil platform was literary a giant base that was located in an ocean of the very same thick, black substance that was pumping through the pipelines with the sound of oversized arteries.

Sonic and Tails had to stay on their toes (or remain suspended in the air with Tails' flight abilities) as the already mentioned poorly built platforms crumbled beneath their feet on their way for the newly recovered chaos emerald, possibly just minutes from Robotnik's itching fingers.

The situation wasn't made any better by the sudden swarm of Robotnik's badniks, this time a swarm of Octus, octopus-like robots that fittingly hid beneath the oil's surface, only to pop up and shoot small fireballs at the two intruders.

But the fox simply flew higher, much to Sonic's dismay, as the blue hedgehog almost had wished for some metallic badnik butt to kick into the next week.

Thankfully, while the Octus were incapable of flight, the seahorse-based robots of Aguis were a little too fast for the twin-tailed fox to avoid, and in response he threw the hedgehog like a blue projectile to deal with the horses, turning the tables on who truly was the faster opponent, as the hedgehog made the process short with every Aguis in reach for his spike-laced attacks.

Touching a firm floor beneath his feet, Sonic awaited Tails and flashed a bright smile. Seeing the fox's confused look, he replied by pointing towards a large round green plate that was used as an air lock for the sewer pipes, which now lay scattered close to a half-pipe with oil, pouring down like the water in a kitchen sink...

------

"YAHOOOO!" Sonic shouted, as Tails held onto his shoulders and flayed behind the hedgehog like a flag in the wind, as the two friends slid down the oil slide, like semi-professional skaters, on top of the green plate, gaining more and more speed with the help of the reduced friction, getting closer and closer to the chaos emerald's location on a steadily accelerating pace.

_**Act II**_

Leaving the ramp behind them, the hedgehog decided to score some style points by grinding across a long green rounded pipe, the only thing that kept them from falling into the sticky oil below, where the could either drown in the black goo, or be chopped into bits by the Octus.

Suddenly, Tails pulled Sonic into the air, so that he lost his temporary trick board. Slightly irritated that the fox had interrupted his stunt, he cast a glance up at Tails' face.

Returning the glance, Tails pointed his index finger forward, and when Sonic followed the fingers direction, he got some slightly wide eyes as he saw the green plate he just had involuntarily left get a spike showed through the centre.

Looking further up ahead, Sonic realized that the spike was just part of a ring just as wide as the pipe itself, covered in deadly appendages that could have sliced Sonic into two if he had kept going.

Turning his eyes back up at Tails, he gave a modest smile and a thumbs-up, which showed the fox that Sonic owed him one.

------

With the surprise seventh emerald in all its grey glory now residing with the original six ones in Sonic and Tails' possession, their business were finished in the Oil Ocean Zone. All that was left was the "suprise visit" by Robotnik in some new war machine to stop the two allies from getting away with "his" chaos emeralds.

The doctor aimed to please, as some bubbles alerted Sonic and Tails that something big was moving below the surface. To big to be an Octus, the doctor arose from the oil in his private submarine, ready to put the two friends to sleep permanently.

The submarine sank again, to both Sonic and Tails' surprise.

The doctor began with a sneak attack, as a long robotic appendage suddenly burst through the surface, covered in oil from tip to... tail and with a pair of jaws clenching and shutting in the end that was aiming for the two targets on the bridge ahead of it.

Like a long slimy snake, the metallic arm covered in oil, slammed into the ground where the hedgehog and the fox had been standing a few seconds ago, wriggled slightly like a tentacle, and then went limp.

Meanwhile, Tails and Sonic looked from up above, both smirking in triumph, unaware that the metallic appendage had only been a distraction manoeuvre.

Tails and Sonic barely dodged the beam as the laser rifle shoot, and both threw themselves to the ground until the assault had subsided from the second extendable arm's weapon, and Robotnik resurfaced from the oil.

Apparently, the small sub didn't seem to have that much of an oxygen-supply to last for more than a few minutes beneath sea level.

That was the two friends time to strike, as Sonic grabbed a new hold of Tails wrists and got thrown towards the cabin and spun into ball form, landing enough hits to the vehicle to make it useless.

A surprisingly easy victory, but an even bigger mistake on Sonic's part.

A spark fell from the force of a sharp hedgehog spike scraping against the steel alloy of Robotnik's submarine, fell to the black oil's surface and touched it. Half a second later, the spark turned into flare, then to a raging fire that grew rapidly. The flames dramatically reflected themselves in Robotnik's glasses, and the doctor quickly pushed a button that triggered the emergency escape pod function on his control panel.

The cabin detached itself from the rest of the vehicle's body, and burst off with an afterburner that only fuelled the flames as the doctor escaped, spending no time mourning about the loss of another emerald.

After all, there had to be another chaos emerald out there for his badniks to recover. With any luck, the pesky hedgehog and the fox would burn up in the fiery inferno that once was Oil Ocean Zone.

But with a flying fox on his side, Sonic could count on a way out of his predicament even with slippery oil that seemed to devour his feet.

------

"Sonic?" Tails asked, seemingly with something on his mind meant for Sonic to hear.

"Yes?" Sonic replied, hanging onto Tails grip as the airborne fox escorted him through the air.

"I was just thinking... We have seven chaos emeralds, right?" Tails said.

"Right." Sonic replied.

"But what if there's even more emeralds? Can we really find all of them before Robotnik does?" Tails wondered.

Taking in the facts, Sonic rubbed his jawbone, apparently thinking over his friend's words.

"Well... Maybe you're right. Maybe we should try to stop the problem at the source, which happens to be Doc Robotnik?"

"Sure thing, Sonic." Tails said in a cheerful manner.

"Well then, let's change course. I, Sonic the Hedgehog and the pilot Miles "Tails" Prower welcomes all hedgehogs and foxes aboard on Tails Airlines, next station: Robotnik's behind for some serious buttkicking!"

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**Author's Notes: **That last line was cornier than most of my ideas put together. Well, that's seven emeralds in the bag. I guess you all know what this will lead up to. The showdown at the Death Egg, and the final chapters of Act 1. Then, only N. Harmonik has gotten information about Act 2. But just ask, and you will get the info to.

**To ****N. Harmonik: **Don't expect anything less of me, sister!

**To Snake15000: **The doctor is a lot of bad things, but he's definitely not a druggy XD

**To NUTCASE71733: **How was that for a reaction?


	10. Chapter 09: Metropolis

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 09****: Metropolis**

(THEME: Metropolis Zone from Sonic 2)

_**Act I**_

The duo was hot on the trail of Dr. Robotnik, as they ran through the mad scientist's newly established city Metropolis, filled with its own set of badniks to protect their master from interruptions while he made a quick stop and had his flight vehicle underwent some hasty repairs, just enough so he could escape before the pesky hedgehog and the fox caught up with him.

------

Thrown into the air by the force of the compressed air pressure inside a corked up piston, the hedgehog and the fox blasted their way through the inner workings of the badnik-producing factories, making short process in dispatching the doctor's badniks in their quest to put an end to Robotonik's plans once and for all.

Sonic ran in a corkscrew-like manner on the inside of a cylinder-shaped mechanism, while Tails simply flew over.

The second that Sonic exited the tube, Tails grabbed a hold of Sonic's wrist and pulled him into the air, out of the reach of Asteron's aerial assault with sharp projectiles.

The Asterons were kamikaze-bots designed to float around and patrol their respective areas, and upon any sign of intruders, they would only have two final commands programmed into their CPU.

The first step would be to send a warning that the trespassers were closing, and secondly to go into instant self-destruct mode, sacrificing itself to put its deadly darts of doom in the flesh of any unfortunate organic beings.

However, their attacks weren't fast enough to nail the speedy hedgehog and the flying fox as they carefully made their way deeper into the Zone.

Of course, their progress didn't go by unnoticed, as a new crab robot made its entrance.

Shellcrackers, which had an oversized claw on either their right or their left side, connected with the rest of their red armour-covered bodies by a retractable iron chain.

This Shellcracker managed to get a shot at the dynamic duo, but the quick hedgehog easily dodged the metallic appendage, grabbed it by the chain and threw it to Tails, who responded bytaking the claw with him and went through a set of air vents, entangling the chain around high-tech, yet old-fashioned security systems of spears that shoot out of the walls. Piercing the red appendage on it and making sure that it was stuck before retreating out of the ventilation system to rejoin with Sonic.

Meanwhile, Sonic had thrown himself into a horizontal spin to cut off the legs of the crab robot, and then opened the back of the Shellcrackers body to reveal a set of wires and circuits.

This was Tails' cue as Sonic jumped off the Shellcracker's back and the airborne fox flew down to rip out a few wires, apparently a planned manoeuvre on Tails' part.

The badnik was taken by complete surprise when its chain suddenly retracted itself without a command from the CPU, and with no legs to support itself and the claw lodged somewhere in the air ventilation system, the crab couldn't do anything but slam headfirst into the ceiling, betrayed by its own weapon, and the small animal trapped inside fell out into the open.

Tails flew back to Sonic and the two friends exchanged a high-five before they moved forward on their progress through the Metropolis Zone. Whether it would have been strange-looking teleporters with advanced instruction manuals or giant hammers that could pound them into flatness reminiscent to that of pancakes or booby-trapped platforms that could make their shoes turn into sandals with thousands of long spikes, the two allies were unstoppable.

But to temporarily distract them wasn't impossible, which the grasshopper-like Slicer robot proved as it attacked the two intruders with its detachable scissor blades.

But unstoppable seemed to be the truth as the Slicer got a big surprise in the form of a ripped off head, and two boomerang blades stuck in it's torso, which Sonic and Tails used to carve out and free the organic battery inside, true to their honour.

When the small creature had been released, Sonic and Tails picked up the pace, now at least halfway through the badnik-infested city.

_**Act II**_

The middle of the city was a power plant that drew power from natural energy sources in the form of the heat of boiling lava, being scooped up in large portions and transported to turbines that spun around violently with their increase in power as the molten rock was pumped through the pipes.

The only major downside was the incredible heat, which was almost unbearable for Sonic and Tails as they ran across conveyor belts and giant cogs to find a cooler way out before they dehydrated.

Their luck made itself apparent as they ran into the core of the city's energy source, and even though none of Robotnik's badniks were vulnerable to the heat, it would have been just plain stupid not to cool down the turbines, since the endurable alloy that the doctor's robots were covered with definitely didn't grow on trees.

And now, the future seemed bright as Sonic and Tails were running through the giant ventilation tunnels and their cooling systems, which were a welcome change of temperature, as the sweat on the their foreheads vaporized into thin air.

The duo was slowly but surely catching up with Robotnik, whether he liked it or not.

_**Act III**_

Robotnik may have been surprised to find that the blue pest and the flying fox had caught up with him so soon but he wasn't completely unprepared.

As Sonic and Tails moved in for a first hit to the cabin, the whole vehicle suddenly flashed away into thin air.

"Where did he go?" Tails wondered.

A snickering... no, several snickering sounds made them turn around to face the answer.

Suspended in mid-air, there were eight Robotniks laughing manically in unison at the pair of mammals.

"Holograms?" Tails marvelled.

"Where does he get all the advanced technology?" Tails deeply wondered.

"Beats me. Holograms or not, this is just eight times the fun in cracking that egg-belly!" Sonic said and threw himself at a random Robotnik, just to pass right through.

"_This might take a while." _Sonic thought, unaware that one of the eight doctor's split from the herd and escaped through an emergency exit while the blue hedgehog and the fox were busy with the seven other ones.

------

Already miles from his robot city, Dr. Robotnik activated the communicator that connected him with every single badnik and computer in his army, and gave a command to be followed immediately on utterment.

"Initiate launch command for Wing Fortress."

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**Author's Notes: **Well, how do you except me to squeeze a 1000-worded chapter simply out of Sky Chase? If I can't, the next chapter will cover both Sky Chase and Wing Fortress.

**To NUTCASE71733: **Just a few more chapters to Super Sonic, but don't except a fight just yet.

**To ****Snake15000: **Only Super Sonic, but no fight scene.

**To ****N. Harmonik: **On the plus side for Robotnik, it wasn't always easy to get out of the oil and back on firm ground.


	11. Chapter 10: Sky Chase

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 10****: Sky Chase**

(THEME: Sky Chase Zone from Sonic 2.)

After having realized that the doctors had been reduced from eight to seven, and concluding that Robotnik had pulled a fast one on them, Sonic and Tails had returned to the beach where the Tornado was parked.

It was there that Tails had gotten his first look at the pinnacle of Dr. Robotnik's mechanical genius, as a large shadow had cast itself over the entire beach, and the duo had looked upon the massive shape of Robotnik's Wing Fortress blocking the sun.

"Where does he find the time to finish those things?" Tails had asked, and Sonic simply could only shrug his shoulders, despite his earlier close encounters with the aerial fortresses of Robotnik's design.

(Author's Note: Check the Sky Base in Sonic S: The Beginning for example.)

There was no doubt that the doctor was piloting the gargantuan sized aircraft, as there were hundreds of Robotnik's flight-based badniks swarming around it to keep intruders out, just waiting for a spinning backside of sharp blue spikes to cut them in halves.

------

As they approached the Wing Fortress in the Tornado, they were suddenly faced with a new problem, as the hordes of flying badniks closed in on them in programmed attack patterns.

Sonic was the only one with experience in the pilot seat of the airplane, but since he didn't have any weapons built-in to the Tornado's design, he was also their only defence against the badnik assault.

Sure, Tails, who didn't even have to worry about gravity, could take out a few tin cans on his own, but certainly not a hundred of those gun-totting misfits.

So Sonic released the steering lever and climbed up on the wings, to which Tails responded by shouting in surprise.

"What are you doing, Sonic?"

"Turning the pilot seat over to you, while I trash some badniks." Sonic replied.

"But...!" Tails began.

"I've got faith in you, kid." Sonic said, flashed a confident smirk and stood straight up on top of the plane's wing, awaiting the badniks with his quills standing on end.

Reluctantly, Tails jumped into the driver's seat of the Tornado and grabbed the steering stick with inexperienced hands.

It went a little shaky at first, but soon, with Sonic's pep talk and coaching, Tails found that he was indeed a natural at flying the airplane. Which was a tad ironic.

All this time, as he had mastered flying with the mutation that had granted him an extra tail since birth, the fox had never realized that his interest in mechanics would lead to actual pilot service.

------

"_The kids a natural." _Sonic thought, impressed by his friend's fast adapting to the controls of his plane, and then receded to concentrate at the task beforehand.

The badniks came in groups depending on attack pattern, and Sonic prepared himself for the aerial assault.

The first set of badniks was a group of red hawk-like, streamlined robots named Balkiry, which moved through the air at jet speed towards the biplane, ready to ram the blue mammal with their sharpened beaks on top of the wings that had been set as the primary target in their homing systems.

As the Balkiry closed in, Sonic jumped of the wings and spun into his spiky ball form, cracked the closest metal bird open and grabbed the small animal inside before bouncing to the next Balkiry and repeated the process.

When all Balkiries were destroyed, Sonic jumped back to the plane and put the frightened animals in the empty passenger seat behind Tails. They chirped and yiffed in fright at first, but Sonic put his index finger to his own lips and hushed slightly.

"Don't worry, ladies and gentlemen. Just stay here and everything will be alright." The blue hedgehog said, and the airplane's new passengers calmed down slightly.

Sonic left the responsibility of keeping the small animals at ease, while he dealt with another incoming squadron of new badniks.

Next up was the helicopter-based Nebuluses, round robots with rotor blades on top of their heads, and rather than ramming their opponents, these badniks relied on dropping bombs when any intruder passed beneath them.

But Tails and Sonic found a way around as Tails distracted the Nebuluses with some aerial antics, while Sonic simply jumped on top of the rotor-heads and ripped both propeller and organic battery out on everyone in the close vicinity.

As the empty shells of several Nebulus fell from the skies, Sonic had another load of passengers in his arms and escorted them back to the biplane for their own safety, and then jumped back into the air for the next threat closing in, which also was the last major obstacle.

The Turtloids, turtle-shaped weapon platforms commanded by smaller robot turtles, were heading for the blue hedgehog for immediate extermination.

But the only extermination to be initiated this time around was Sonic's merciless deployment of the small and defenceless badniks, ripping out their organic batteries and leaving the turtle platforms without a driver to control their movements.

Wasting no time reflecting on his victories, Sonic jumped back to the plane using the useless weaponry platforms, and dumped his last load of innocent bystanders into the passenger seat, and then returned to his standing position on top of the wings.

"The Wing Fortress is right up ahead, Sonic!" Tails exclaimed.

Sonic directed his gaze forwards, and as soon as the clouds cleared, he finally got a close look at Dr. Robotnik's latest masterpiece.

The Wing Fortress seemed even more massive at a closer range, as the plane lowered itself to find an entrance in the lower parts of the flying fortress.

Neither Tails or Sonic, nor any of the small animals saw the vast array of giant laser guns lining up behind them and glowing red...

------

The assault was too quick even for Sonic to react fast enough, and the laser fire pierced the left wing. Luckily for the blue hedgehog, he was on the right wing at the moment of the attack, able to get a glance through the fire and smoke at the panicking animals and Tails fighting with keeping the damaged plane under control.

"Tails! You gotta bring this plan down safely!" Sonic shout.

"I can't! The fortress has weapons everywhere! There's not a safe spot on the whole ship!" Tails shout back.

Sonic then jumped to the edge of the still intact right wing, looking out over the Wing Fortress for a firm footing space.

"What are you doing, Sonic?!" Tails exclaimed.

"You try to take the Tornado back on safe ground at Westside Island! I'm going for Robotnik." Sonic replied.

"But, Sonic..." Tails said.

"No "butts", Tails. Except for Robotnik's, which I'm going to kick into next Sunday!" Sonic silenced his friend.

Tails suddenly threw something to Sonic, which he caught relatively easy with a lightning fast movement. He looked into his palms and saw three of the chaos emeralds, complementing the four he had hidden in the sea of blue quills on his back.

The hedgehog looked up at Tails with a confused look.

"Remember what happened at Aquatic Ruin?" Tails said.

(Author's Note: Chapter 4, folks.)

"I don't know exactly how you did it, but I think you somehow tapped into the power of the chaos emeralds. And you're going to need all the power you can get." The fox explained.

Sonic stuffed the emeralds into his secret hiding place and then saluted Tails with a bright smile one last time, before throwing himself off the biplane's wing towards the Wing Fortress below...

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**Author's Notes: **Well, what do you know? I managed to squeeze a whole chapter out of that short stage! The Death Egg is getting closer...

**To NUTCASE71733: **I think I'll stick to the holograms, the whole balloon scheme seems so... corny.

**To N. Harmonik: **Aww, cut me some slack, will ya?

**To ****Snake15000: **If you only knew how many times I've singing on an old Swedish song, that's about nothing but eggs...

**To K Twenty Two: **Sorry that I forgot to thank you last time, so here it comes: Thanks for adding my story to your favourites.


	12. Chapter 11: Wing Fortress

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 11****: Wing Fortress**

(THEME: Wing Fortress Zone from Sonic 2.)

Sonic crashed through a window into a room inside of the Wing Fortress at tremendous speed, but thanks to his compact ball form, he got away with a slightly dizzy head and some bruises on his knees and arms, more from the force of the fall rather than the sharp shards of glass falling around him.

As the blue hedgehog slowly regained a standing position, the well-known voice of Dr. Robotnik thundered throughout the whole fortress, carried by hundreds of sirens blaring like doomsday.

"_Intruder Alert! Activate all defence systems! Cluckers, prepare all guns__ for immediate annihilation!"_

"_Seems like I better get moving." _Sonic thought and dashed off at full speed.

------

The Cluckers, as Robotnik called them, sat in their gun towers, firing at will at the speedy hedgehog as he made his way through the Wing Fortress at a dangerously quick, aided by the sonic boom generated by his top speed as he swept through the defences, sending the Cluckers and everything that lay loose into the air due to the massive draft.

With all debris following and falling in his windy path, Sonic made it to the top of the aerial fortress, where there were fewer guns for intruders and more for aerial attack antics.

Something suddenly caught Sonic's eye and he screeched to a halt.

He found himself standing on a large white letter spelling "E." A few quick runs back and forth revealed the rest of the text for the blue hedgehog's eyes.

"_Wing Fortress__ Model 29-00. Copyright Eggman-01."_

"_Is he using the perfect__ nickname as a copyright mark?" _Sonic scratched his head in an amused gesture at the fact that his mockery had lead to tab for the doctor to put on his personal patents.

(Author's Note: It was Sonic and Robotnik's first meeting in the Green Hill Zone, check Sonic S: The Beginning.)

"_I wonder if I can go up in court with this..."_Sonic thought, as he shrugged his should and returned to the business at hand of finding Robotnik.

------

With some of the many weapon towers crossfire breathing him in the neck, Sonic grabbed a hold of a chain with a hook in the end, hanging loosely without a purpose for the moment, and swung his way forward through the air, until he reached safe footing to land on. The blue hedgehog let go of the chain, flipped through the air a few times before landing safely on his two feet.

Or that was what he thought.

A sudden draft caught him off-balance, and Sonic was sent flying backwards, carried by the turbulence towards a few kilometres of free fall, which would surely lead to a deadly impact with the distant ground below.

Sonic wasn't about to let that happen, and as the blue hedgehog fell down the side of the Wing Fortress, he grabbed a hold of a panel that he didn't know was only there to protect some important machinery below.

Thinking he was safe for the moment, Sonic suddenly realized how short that moment really was as the panel creaked beneath his clutching fingers, and gave up for the sudden weight.

Sonic spun wildly through the air once again; bouncing of the wall downward, until he finally caught a steady metal railing in his hands.

Taking a few moments to recollect on his surroundings, the blue hedgehog went to work at getting back on track, and used his fast-moving feet to run back across the wall, aiming straight for the cockpit. A few guns extended themselves from the outer wall of the Wing Fortress, aiming for the hedgehog as he came dangerously close to the entrance.

Unknown to the weapon systems, as the shots whined past Sonic's ears, the guns actually had lent him a helping hand.

With a lightning fast movement, Sonic's grabbed a weapon pipe and pulled himself into the air. Next up, he jumped from gun to gun; rendering them uselessly bent pointing down and inwards as he finally found the doorway into the fortress...

------

The corridors of the Wing Fortress were surprisingly traversable, due to the lack of inner security systems. Sonic highly doubted that the doctor would have been stupid enough to put all his anti-intruder weapons on the outside of his mechanical creation, but none on the inside.

His suspicions were confirmed, as the blue hedgehog suddenly slammed headfirst into an invisible wall and was thrown back by the ricocheting force. Sonic got back to a sitting position and rubbed his head as it pounded like a drum, thankful that his blue quills didn't give away the full size of the new lump he had in his forehead.

A familiar voice suddenly erupted from the other side of the invisible wall.

"You stumbled right into my trap, hedgehog."

Robotnik stepped out of the shadows from his hiding place, with a triumphant smile crossing horizontally over his face, extending from corner to corner of the doctor's mouth.

Sonic regained his standing position and looked around, only to realize that the doctor was indeed correct.

The blue hedgehog was trapped like a rat in a cage, in a corridor and surrounded by two force field barriers. Nevertheless, the cocky hedgehog simply shrugged and spoke in a joking manner.

"I wouldn't call it stumbling. More like slamming headfirst into it." Sonic replied, pointing to his forehead.

"Indeed. But you're still my prisoner. Do you really think that you would have gotten this far unless I had planned it?" Robotnik boasted about himself.

"Actually, I was thinking off having trashed your giant flying tin can and being back home for diner by now." Sonic jokingly added, fuelling a slight irritated undertone in Robotnik's further .

"Joke around all you want, hedgehog, it won't help you now. You've got something that I want."

"There's no use in hiding it, my scanners are picking up the chaos emeralds energy. Just hand them over, or else...!"

"Then I pick "or else." Sonic answered, not ready to give up just yet.

Robotnik snarled, and pulled out a remote control from his pocket. A quick push off a button and a small opening appeared in the ceiling over Sonic's head. Sonic lifted his head and found himself staring into the pipe at the end of a giant laser weapon.

"In that case, I'll just have to take them from your rotting corpse!"

A second push of a button, and the space with one blue hedgehog between the two invisible barriers was filled out with three round floating spheres with a row of spikes spinning like chainsaws to chop the hedgehog into small pieces of hedgehog meat.

Sonic let out a whistle, almost impressed by the doctor's efforts.

Robotnik lifted his finger, prepared to give the command of firing to the laser gun in the ceiling...

Then, dropping the charade, the blue hedgehog jumped on top of the first sphere before it could react and delivered a kick to the massive laser gun, just enough to change its aim a bit...

Robotnik pushed the button, only to see his own body being bathed in blue light, very familiar to the light of his weapon the moment just before fire.

Lifting his gaze forward, Robotnik found himself staring into the very gun pipe that the blue pest had been staring into just a few seconds ago.

And the weapon was about to fire.

Robotnik threw himself out of the way of the laser beam, surprisingly quick for a man with that much excess bulk.

The blue laser beam cut like a warm knife cuts through butter through the invisible barrier, making an opening that didn't shrink back into nothing fast enough to stop Sonic. Ready to kick Robotnik to kingdom come, Sonic jumped through the hole in the force field, but found that Robotnik was nowhere to be seen, as the doctor already had made his escape.

A slight shaking that seemed to affect the entire Wing Fortress puzzled Sonic, wondering if the ship was under attack.

Unknown to the blue hedgehog, the Wing Fortress shook because it had made a successful docking with its final destination.

The Death Egg.

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**Author's Notes: **Next chapter will be easy to get up, since it will be a fight scene. Which is something of a talent I have.

**To NUTCASE71733: **There won't be a death for Tails in my series, as long as it doesn't happen in any official storylines.

**To N. Harmonik: **Not on Sonic's watch, N.

**To Snake15000: **Not the final fight for this story, but the very same fight you're wishing for is getting nearer.


	13. Chapter 12: Death Egg

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 12****: Death Egg**

(THEME: Death Egg Zone from Sonic 2.)

A quick glance out a window that the blue hedgehog passed revealed that this new place was some kind of satellite located at the outer limits of the atmosphere.

Sonic repeated his question about where the doctor found the time to build these mechanical masterpieces, and then proceeded on his hunt for Robotnik, and what possibly could be a final showdown.

------

Upon entering a particularly large chamber, Sonic heard the sound of engines roaring. Expecting Robotnik to show up in a new war machine, just for the blue hedgehog to use for target practice, Sonic was somewhat surprised to see what the doctor had sent to stop him this time.

A large, clunky silver-coloured robot descended from the ceiling by jet streams that safely put it down on the floor a few metres ahead. What really caught Sonic's attention was the fact that the metallic contraption had a striking resemblance to his own looks of perfection, with a line of spikes spanning across its backside.

The new robot didn't move, apparently in stand by mode.

Suddenly, a wide screen revealed itself, and the familiar face of Robotnik appeared on the monitor, snickering mildly.

"Welcome to the Death Egg, Sonic."

Sonic clenched his fist, feeling a need to smash the monitor into pieces just by looking at the doctor's face, but kept himself in check enough to hear the rest of Robotnik's voices.

"My so far greatest creation, a formidable weapon of unimaginable power." The doctor boasted.

"Sadly, without the power of the chaos emeralds, my beautiful machine doesn't have enough energy to stay in orbit more than a few minutes before it plummets to Mobius... unless you surrender the emeralds to me, hedgehog."

"You already know the answer to that one, doc." Sonic said, obviously not in the mood for treachery.

"Very well." Robotnik replied, and then turned his tone of voice from that of a negotiator to that of the commander of all badniks.

"Mecha Sonic!"

The mechanical quills on the robot's back moved in a saw-like manner, buzzing slightly, and the robot's eye sensors light up in a red glow, focusing on the blue hedgehog in front of it.

"Destroy him!"

(THEME: Boss Theme from Sonic 2.)

"I'm quite flattered by the design, Robotnik. But I'm still going to turn this roast bucket into a heap of scrap metal!" Sonic said with a triumphant smile on his lips.

Robotnik simply leaned back into his chair in front of the camera, silently whispering:

"We'll see, hedgehog. We'll see."

The doctor then concentrated on his own moustache, pulling slightly on it by the soft hairs.

"_And if you do, I still have a back-up plan.__" _The doctor thought.

"_Nevertheless, this should be an interesting battle."_

------

The Sonic-robot made its first move by turning into a ball with saw blades sticking out everywhere, spinning with a screeching, metallic sound, darkly mirroring Sonic's own spin dash manoeuvre.

The mechanical hedgehog might have had his looks, but the tin can wasn't even near as fast the original, which only made it a whole lot easier for Sonic to jump over the metallic pinball as it rolled across the floor towards him.

Missing the hedgehog with about half a mile as it passed underneath him, the robot slammed into the wall, damaging itself in what would have been considered stupidity if it had been the action of an organic creature.

The machine quickly recovered, and made its next attack by firing up a jet engine that erupted from its back, and moved forward in a burst of speed to ram the blue hedgehog.

Sonic responded by throwing himself to the side, holding in the urge to shout "Olé" as his robotic counterpart moved past him and slammed into a wall once again.

Shaking off pieces of metal that had fallen from the wall after the impact, the robot hedgehog commenced its assault by jumping into its artificial spiky ball form once more.

"Out of moves, tin can?" Sonic smirked.

Suspended in mid-air, the metallic hedgehog suddenly released all of its spikes in a deadly cascade of metal that rained across the room.

The wide-eyed Sonic was given just a few seconds to utter:

"That's a new one."

Sonic escaped the aerial assault without any fatal injury by the use of his speed and agility, albeit with his white gloves and socks ripped into pieces by the sharp spikes.

And now, seeing his chance, Sonic sprung into his ball form and, slammed into Mecha Sonic's body and cut a hole straight through his robot duplicate's torso before it could prepare another array of pointy projectiles.

With his Mecha Sonic destroyed, Robotnik decided to run to his back-up plan before the blue pest caught up with him.

------

(THEME: Final Boss Theme from Sonic 2.)

With newfound confidence, Sonic ran into the next large chamber, just in time to see Robotnik jump into a pod sticking up from the floor, which bore a striking resemblance to the doctor's facial features.

Sonic could hardly contain his laughter as he ran up to the pod's face and slightly nudged it with his shoe.

"This is your last plan, Robotnik?" The blue hedgehog snickered.

"What is it? A bunker to protect you from blue hedgehog quills?"

Imagine the silence that spread over Sonic's mouth as the floor suddenly shook and parted itself as the pod slowly revealed itself to be the cockpit of an enormous robot that resembled Robotnik in almost every way, except in size, strength and artillery.

"If my Death Egg is doomed to fall from the skies... then you will go down with it, Sonic the Hedgehog!" Robotnik's voice thundered through a speaker in the robot's torso.

With those words, the iron giant jumped into the air to squash the blue hedgehog with the underside of its heavy feet.

Sonic barely dodged the robot as it slammed into the ground where he once stood a few seconds ago, and the earthquake generated by the impact shook the floor so the blue hedgehog tripped over his own feet and was put out of action for a split second.

A split second that Robotnik intended to use to his advantage.

The robot lifted its massive hand and plunged it's hand into the ground where Sonic was, trapping the hedgehog between two metallic claws and pushing him against floor and lifting its second arm, ready to deal the final blow that would lead to the curtain call for Sonic the Hedgehog.

"Prepare to die, hedgehog!" Robotnik exclaimed, mere seconds from squishing the blue hedgehogs head into nothing.

"Not this time, Robotnik!" Sonic shout back, and managed to get each of his four appendages, arm and arm, leg and leg, to push up against the robot's strong arm, but the giant was relentless and clenched its robotic fist to finish him off.

When it all seemed hopeless, Sonic suddenly felt a surge of strength coming from deep within him, spreading from his elbows into his hands and chest. With superhuman... Sorry, superhedgehog effort, Sonic finally managed, with gritted teeth, to push the giant robot of his body.

Robotnik was taken by surprise at this sudden resistance, and his giant robot waddled dizzily backwards as the insignificant blue hedgehog was neither insignificant nor blue anymore.

Instead, Sonic's entire body was covered in a golden aura, while his monotone-coloured eyes had turned a distinct shade of green to match. Sonic took one step forward, and as he put his foot down with a thud, a large crack appeared in the floor from beneath the sole and all the way to the giant robot's feet.

You could hear a faint nervous gulping sound coming from the cockpit after Sonic's display of newfound power.

That was all it took for Sonic to move faster than ever before and ram his body headfirst into the iron giant, splitting it in half as easy as splitting a hair. With a triumphant smirk as the golden glow faded into a thinner glow that acted as a transparent second skin, Sonic watched as the impressive machine crumbled at his might.

Suddenly, Sonic caught sight of some oil that leaked from the robot, and one blink later; a flare of fire hit the liquid and ignited.

But Sonic was already gone, surprisingly quick even with his speed, as the machine exploded in a ball of fire that started a much bigger explosion than either Robotnik or Sonic had anticipated.

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**Author's Notes: **Not really Super Sonic just yet, only Sonic with enhanced strength and a protective aura. But still good enough to satisfy any Super Sonic fans, I hope. Next up, the midlogue.

**To NUTCASE71733: **Chaos Emeralds are a hedgehog's best friends.

**To N. Harmonik: **I don't think the composer of that song exist in this universe.

**To Snake15000: **May the force be with him in his quest for that life.

**To Blue Mage Quartet: **Welcome back!


	14. Midlogue

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Midlogue**

(THEME: Ending from Sonic 2.)

Tails stared in awe at the explosion from the beach at the coastline of the Westside Island, still feeling faint shockwaves at such a far distance from the Death Egg. With all the small inhabitants rescued from Robotnik's Wing Fortress and the badniks spread across the whole island, across every zone, deep underground and high up in the sky, looking at the lightshow while the fox clenched his fist softly and then took flight a few meters over the ground.

Tails flew over to the Tornado, despite the excessive damage that had been dealt to it, and positioned himself in the pilot's seat, starting up the engines for a hasty take-off. The Flickies chirped wildly, urging the fox not to go.

But Tails didn't believe one second that Sonic had met his demise in the explosion, the blue hedgehog was too tough for that. So, suicide flight or not, Tails intended to find his blue friend, dead or alive.

And the Tornado took of, with a swarm of flying animals, with a majority of Flickies, following in its trail.

------

There were still some pieces of debris falling from the sky, obviously slowed down upon re-entry through the atmosphere.

But there was no sign of Sonic anywhere.

Tails was about to give up the search, when suddenly, a bright golden light burst through the clouds, blinding everyone that were unfortunate enough to look up towards the sky at the moment.

Was it the sun?

No, the beams of light were way too intense for that.

"Hey Tails, over here!" A familiar voice rang through the air and reached the fox's ears.

Tails lifted his gaze the second the first words sunk in, his jaw hanging gapingly wide at the sight before him when his eyes had adjusted to the immense light.

"S... Sonic?" Tails stuttered out.

"The one and only."

Flying by his own power, the golden hedgehog glowed even more intensely than the light beams surrounding the air around his considerably changed hedgehog body.

Slowly descending towards the Tornado, Sonic gave Tails the view he needed to take in more details.

Through the golden aura, that now seemed to be more of a part of the once blue hedgehog rather than a shield of yellow flames, Tails saw just how drastically that Sonic had changed. With his blue-turned-golden quills on his head's backside pointing upwards, Sonic's head slightly resembled a star from a the front. Speaking of facial features, the golden hedgehog had eye's that glowed with power just like the rest of Sonic's body, except for at the end of his limbs that still were covered by white gloves and red sneakers.

That's when the Tornado decided to give up in a last cough of smoke.

Tails quickly undid his seatbelt and jumped out of the plane as the rotor blades halted, and began whirling his own organic rotor to gain momentum for his flight to safety as the plane fell from the sky, back down to Mobius below.

Tails turned back to Sonic, only to find that the golden hedgehog weren't present anymore, except for the quickly disappearing streak of light that were pointing downwards, down through the clouds that the biplane had fallen a few seconds ago...

------

With the constant updrafts and side winds, it took Tails a great deal of time to make it safely back on firm ground on his twin tails alone.

After about half an hour of aerial antics and decrease in air pressure, Tails finally saw the surface of Westside Island and landed at the coastline. The inhabitants looking at the sky, fewer than they had been half an hour ago, were still was an impressive sight by their sheer size in numbers.

Asking if they had seen a golden hedgehog fly through, Tails only heard whispers and comments about his own state of mind, at least until a small part of the horde told him that the had caught a quick glimpse of what could fit his description, but the only further details they remembered was that the golden flash had carried a massive, heavy-looking metallic object into the forest...

------

Tails flew through the forest, circling every tree and branch in his way before he found what he had been searching for.

There, in an opening in the woods, Sonic was whistling slightly as he tweaked a few screws with a wrench, apparently trying to fix the damage dealt to his beloved plane.

"Sonic!" Tails shout, and the blue hedgehog turned his gaze to the floating fox as he quickly approached, flashing Tails one of his patented bright trademark smiles.

"What...?" Tails began, but Sonic cut him off.

"Ran out of juice when I got down to the island. I still managed to steer the Tornado clear off course before someone of your admirers got a wing stuck in their heads."

Tails shifted from foot to foot a bit at the remark, but then shook his head slightly.

"But the power of the chaos emeralds should have..."

"Guess the so called "magical gemstones of infinite energy" aren't all their cracked up to be." Sonic said, and shrugged his shoulders.

Tails, apparently content with that particular statement, still persisted with one final question.

"But where are they now?" The fox asked, referring to the chaos emeralds.

"Gone." Sonic simply answered, resulting in Tails going wide-eyed.

"Hopefully for good this time. I have better things to do than to baby-sit chaos emeralds 24/7."

"But what about Robotnik?" Tails wondered.

"He won't be a problem anymore." Sonic responded, not giving any further explanation.

How wrong the blue hedgehog had been.

A dark shadow suddenly flashed by before Sonic's eyes, and in the middle of the time between two seconds, Tails had suddenly disappeared.

Not without a trace, however, as Sonic heard Tails' voice shouting for help, and grow fainter, indicating that someone had decided that it was a perfect day for foxnapping.

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**Author's Notes:**Nothing can ruin good storytelling like a weekend school assignment, huh? Well, have to get to work on the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, see ya next chapter.

**To**** Snake15000: **I hate to admit it, but the doctor's a lot tougher than that.

**To N. Harmonik: **Does this chapter clear up any questions?

**To Blue Mage Quartet: **If I ever made it to the Death Egg, I would probably not stand a chance without rings.

**To NUTCASE71733: **Yes, but like you said, that was in the Game Gear version. The first half of the story is based on the Mega Drive version, and the next half is based on the Game Gear version. I treat them as two different Sonic robots, since they have slight, but still apparent differences.


	15. Chapter 13: A Hero's Work Is Never Done

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 13: ****A Hero's Work Is Never Done**

(THEME: Intro from Sonic 2, 8-bit.)

Tails struggled to get free from the situation that the young fox found himself in, but the oversized pinchers just wouldn't let go of his two namesake tails, tightly lodged between the two metallic clappers.

The orb-shaped machine that held the young fox captive flew through the forest at a tremendous speed, but still slowly enough so that Sonic could follow his friend and his kidnapper without losing them.

Sonic's feet stomped at a steady pace between the trees and their and leaves, keeping up with the strange mechanical contraption that had foxnapped his two-tailed pal. Whoever it was that had plans for Tails, the speedy blue hedgehog would soon thwart him, like he always did when there was trouble afoot.

The spherical device suddenly stopped and floated in mid-air, just out of reach for the blue hedgehog to save his pal. Sonic tapped his foot impatiently, awaiting the orb's next action. Prepared for some kind of attack pattern, the blue hedgehog was greatly surprised at what happened next.

The upper half of the metallic orb pulled back so that there was only the lower half-sphere left that held the two-tailed fox trapped, and from the upper half, a familiar face appeared...

"Robotnik!?" Sonic exclaimed in a seriously surprised manner.

"The one and the same." Robotnik replied, but not with the "cruel ruler" enthusiasm that the blue hedgehog was used to.

Rather than a toothy grin that would uncover the white teeth from beneath Robotnik's wide moustache, his mouth was seemingly stuck in a downside snarl that even made the moustache hang down in a serious manner.

"You blasted my Death Egg down from the skies, Sonic." The doctor growled.

Sonic simply smirked and crossed his arms across his chest, obviously proud of his accomplishment.

"How observant." The blue hedgehog answered, seizing the opportunity to mock the doctor some more.

"Silence!" Robotnik ordered.

Sonic complied, not to let the scientist boss him around, but to get to the end of Robotnik's ranting spree.

"I have another proposition for you, Sonic." The scientist said and reached behind his back with left arm. Sonic's eyes went wide at the surprise that Robotnik had kept secret up until now.

There, in the palm of his hand, Robotnik held the grey chaos emerald that Sonic had lost just a few hours ago.

For once, the blue hedgehog was in a total loss of words, while Robotnik had barely used a quarter of his vocabulary.

"Here's the deal, hedgehog. Either you bring me the six remaining chaos emeralds, which my scanners decided have returned to South Island, and help me ensure total domination of Mobius. Or you can refuse and your two-tailed friend here will make a formidable new badnik."

The pinchers tightened their grip in on Tails' namesakes, forcing a yelp out of the abducted fox.

"What's it gonna be, Sonic?" Robotnik asked, awaiting Sonic's reply eagerly.

------

At just a slightly slower pace than usual, Sonic made it back to the Tornado parked in the woods of Westside Island, having given in to the doctor's demands.

Picking up a not so random tool, Sonic became nothing but a blue streak of movements as he tightened a screw in the wing, then went back to the pile of tools, dropped the wrench to get a hammer and flattened a budge bellow the white letter "O" in the metal, went back to the pile of tools and dropped the hammer...

When the blue streak was done and the clouds of dust had cleared, the Tornado looked as good as new.

At least if you didn't count the missing propeller that Sonic held under his arm, which he was about to put up as the final touch to his workmanship.

But as he picked the wrench up, his eyes suddenly fell on a pair of initials carved into the wrench's handle.

_**M.P**_

"_**M**__iles __**P**__rower." _Sonic thought, thinking about his fox buddy still trapped in Robotnik's clutches.

"Just hold on, little buddy." Sonic whispered and took a new firm grip of the wrench, not only to fix his biplane up, but also as a promise to save his friend from the doctor's schemes.

------

Tails was dropped into a containment cell from the opening in the ceiling, his double set of tails still aching too much from the pinchers for the young fox to dampen the fall with his flight ability. With a semi-loud thud, Tails landed on his behind, but was quickly back on his feet to pound on the glass surrounding him, to the sadistic delight of Robotnik.

"You won't get away with this, Robotnik! Sonic will..." Tails began, but the doctor cut him off in mid-sentence.

"...Do exactly as I command. No matter what task I order him to complete, the pesky hedgehog will obey in return for your safety, fox." Robotnik bragged.

"But to be completely honest..." Robotnik said, and stretched behind his back.

Tails' eyes widened at what Robotnik held in his outstretched hand, which was the green chaos emerald, supposedly one of the ones Sonic had been assigned to find for the doctor.

But if Robotnik already had two of the chaos emeralds, leaving five on South Island, why tell the blue hedgehog to get him six? Tails' overdeveloped brain deduced that it was more than just a mathematical error, but also that...

"It was planned." Tails exclaimed, Robotnik's plan uncovering inside of his mind.

Robotnik smirked with a toothy grin.

"Excactly." The doctor replied, retreating into the darkness.

"The hedgehog will hunt for the five emeralds left on South Island, running straight into my cleverly hidden traps. And if he somehow manages to escape and indeed bring me, then my latest mechanical masterpiece will make the process short."

The green emerald's glow was all the fox could make out in the darkness for a few seconds. And when the glow fainted, a pair of blue flashlights that moved from side to side like a pair of eyes, whirring in a metallic manner.

"I know you can tell that the deal is off. But I intend to keep my promises. Don't worry fox, I will not endanger your safety. It's the hedgehog's safety that will be endangered." Robotnik's voice snickered.

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**To Blue Mage Quartet: **Yes, I would be a fool to try and count the times.

**To Snake15000: **That's 9 years from now, at least gamewise.

**To N. Harmonik**Nostalgia. What else did you expect from such a classic game's adaption?

**To NUTCASE71733: **You and me both, brother.


	16. Chapter 14: Going Underground

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 14: ****Going Underground On South Island**

(THEME: Underground Zone from Sonic 2, 8-bit.)

The recently established mining processes started on South Island had lead to a new set of tunnels that penetrated and passed through every last underground zone, right down to the set of tunnels that made up the vastly different underground zones of the Marble Zone and the Labyrinth Zone.

(Notes: Go back to Sonic S: The Beginning.)

Apparently, the doctor had been keeping himself busy before he proceeded on his quest for the chaos emeralds to Westside Island.

After landing the Tornado at the coastline and being intercepted and escorted by a group of badniks with their gun pipes still pointed towards his spiky head, only forced by their master's command to leave the blue hedgehog alone to them keep off following their basic programming to either capture organic batteries or exterminate them, Sonic soon found himself at the entrance to the hundreds of main shafts in the middle of the considerable chain of mountains present on the island...

------

_**Act I**_

After some briefing from Robotnik trough the badniks communication devices, Sonic had learned that these tunnels had been finished somewhere around at the same time as the blue hedgehog had left for Westside Island to re-recover the emeralds that had mysteriously "decided" to retreat before either Sonic or Robotnik could use them.

But now, when six of the emeralds had supposedly returned to South Island and given the first energy reading from the hazardous tunnels, the underground mine had already went too far into instability, and with all the seismic activity and lava flows, it was impossible for the badniks to safely venture in to find the magical gem, hidden somewhere in the deepest bowels of the caves.

That's where Sonic came in. Perhaps with his incredible speed and agility, he could recover the chaos emerald for Robotnik, when the badniks failed him.

And if not, Robotnik would finally get rid off the hedgehog that hindered his plans from fulfilment, and could always come up with a back-up plan if his forcibly hired servant didn't make it.

------

Sonic followed the rail-track that was used to carry various mine carts down to the deepest caves and up again with newly acquired treasures. Luckily enough for the blue hedgehog, he wouldn't suffer the same fate as the carts that didn't make it back.

First, there was the thing with the small, but pointy stalagmites that were dangerously hanging over the hedgehog's head as he made it through the tunnel, with any slight vibration threatening to bring them down on his blue-furred body.

But when a sudden earthquake shook the tunnel and brought the stony pillars down just as the badniks warned, Sonic didn't come unprepared.

Going into a spin, Sonic rolled as a compact spiky ball across the cave floor with stalagmites falling and shattering into rocky pieces as they made impact with the ground around him. Those stalagmites that were placed in the line for a descent on the blue hedgehog's body, simply bounced off the spinning ball by the force of the speed and spinning motion that moved it forward.

Just a few meters more and Sonic would be out of danger, at least for the moment.

------

What started of as a few meters became a few hundred meters instead as Sonic had found himself heading for a wall; which had left him with only two possible options: 

Either he could turn around and endure another load of falling rocks and stalagmites, or use his spin dash like never before and get either suffocation or freedom, depending on his stamina.

But with all those deadly objects coming at him from above, it quickly became apparent to the blue hedgehog that he had to go for the living buzz saw plan after all...

------

A faint whirring sound echoed throughout another cave room in Robotnik's newly established mine, gradually growing louder and louder as the ceiling began to shake without any sign of seismic activity.

Except for the blue hedgehog that had spun himself a few miles away from certain doom, his rotating ball form now spewing dust and debris everywhere as he worked through the final earth layer that lead to freedom on the other side, unknowingly setting himself up for a freefall experience as the rocky wall creaked beneath his spin dash's expert manipulation of rock.

Sonic burst out and down from the ceiling, surprised by the sudden lack of solid material to dig through, and the blue hedgehog barely managed to regain his coordination before he landed on his behind in one of the mine carts that stood parked in the middle of a rail track.

Before the blue hedgehog could make a mental remark about his hurting behind, the cart suddenly creaked threateningly, as a warning for things to come.

Sonic's ears and eyes both widened simultaneously at the sound, the eyes going slightly wider than the ears when they registered the moment the cart started leaning slightly forward, a split-second before the cart, still carrying its unintended passenger, rallied down a slope, taking Sonic deeper into the underground...

------

The mine cart and the hedgehog and were now deep down enough to get light from the burning lava that came in large oceans, illuminating the entire cavern and chasing away the darkness.

But even though the lava had positive traits to generously share with the hedgehog's sight, it still revealed an incoming danger.

The railroad was coming to an end at a cliff hanging over an entire sea of molten rock deep below. The cart went over the edge, but Sonic had been prepared and jumped at the moment the wagon went over, gaining enough momentum to make it to the other side.

Now, looking out over the lava and seeing the metallic cart fall in, get devoured and digested by the boiling liquid in a matter of seconds, he slapped his hands off against each other.

"_Close call." _Sonic thought, shrugged his shoulders and prepared himself for a dash, when something suddenly caught his eye.

There, at the beginning of another hazardous slope, another mine cart stood parked, ready for the taking for anyone that wished to go on a wild ride.

Sonic gave a slight smirk in response. Even though the last journey almost had led him to a fiery doom, it hadn't completely robbed him off his need for thrills...

------

_**Act II**_

Despite the mishmash threats of runaway mine carts, crumbling caverns and boiling lava pits, Sonic still made it quite easily to the chamber that Robotnik's had pinpointed where the chaos emerald lay hidden.

Like a blue blur, the hedgehog searched every corner of the cavern until he finally dug up something that glowed blue in the semi-dark, semi-light that bathed the cave's inside.

"_One down, five to go."_

But what Sonic didn't know was that his new hunt for the chaos emeralds was just a scheme planned by Robotnik, right down to the kidnapping of Tails, and that the vicious doctor was planning a little surprise for the delivery of the first emerald to accompany his own, without the blue hedgehog knowing about the other one he had snatched right beneath Sonic's nose and used for his own nefarious purposes.

_**Act III**_

"_Boy, sure is dark in here." _Sonic thought, as the tunnel to the surface seemed to get even darker as he jogged through it, not even able to see his own hand in front of his face.

"_I better slow down before I hit a wall." _The blue hedgehog thought, unaware that he was about to experience the completely opposite situation.

A sudden flash of light startled the hedgehog, and Sonic covered his eyes with his arms to shield them from the sudden change from complete and utter darkness to bright shining light in the environment, still slowing down from his supersonic dash.

Suddenly, Sonic felt himself slightly more light-footed than usual. Actually, it almost felt like he was walking on nothing but clouds...

With his eyes having adjusted to the light, the blue hedgehog lowered his arms and unfolded his eyelids...

Only to find that he was stomping his feet through thin air, and not on firm ground.

Apparently, the hedgehog had moved a bit too fast for his own good. The flashing light had actually been the light at end of the tunnel, and Sonic had, in his dash for the exit, put himself in mortal danger.

And now, Sonic found himself falling hopelessly towards a sea of the magma he had so skilfully dodged before. With no golden rings to sustain him from damage and nothing to grab a hold of, it looked as if the blue hedgehog's days were numbered.

"GOTCHA!" A familiar voice suddenly thundered, accompanied by a sudden jerk in Sonic's leg, halting the blue hedgehog's death fall abruptly and now ascending him from the orange ocean below.

Sonic lifted his head to see that his foot had been caught in a pair of metallic snatchers, belonging to Robotnik's trademark one-seated aircraft, with none other than the doctor pulling the levers.

The flight vehicle descended towards a cliff at the other side of the lava ocean, releasing the blue hedgehog from its secure grip around his ankle. Sonic dusted himself off, looking up at Robotnik as he hovered above him, giving the doctor a scorned look.

"Thanks for the rescue." Sonic simply uttered, obviously willing to rather plant a kick in the doctor's face.

"Just find the rest of the emeralds, hedgehog." Robotnik replied, with just as much contempt for the hedgehog in exchange.

No more words were exchanged and Sonic took off. Left was just a smirking Robotnik that dropped a bleeping bomb at the hill, threatening to start a rockslide once it exploded...

------

As Sonic was about to move on to the next zone, he was suddenly faced with an unforeseen obstacle.

Apparently, one of Robotnik's badniks hadn't gotten the message that Sonic was on its master's side for the moment, and the giant antlion robot burst up from the ground just like the creature it was named after.

The blue hedgehog skid to a halt as the rocks were spewed up into the air around him, awaiting the robot's first attack. He heard a rumble of giant rocks, which suggested that the mechanical antlion was digging itself up.

But why did it seem like the robot was doing nothing but sticking up its ugly head, with two chompers pinching and retracting wildly in a scissor-like manner?

The rumble seemed to get closer, and only then did the blue hedgehog realize that it was coming from behind him.

Sonic turned around, and got wide-eyed at the sight that reflected itself in his eyes.

Hundreds off boulders, some of them gargantuan in size, some of them as small as marbles, came tumbling down the hill that Sonic had left behind him a few minutes ago.

The blue hedgehog spent no time standing around like a statue, instead focusing on getting out of this dangerous situation in one piece. Springing himself into the air with his powerful legs, Sonic jumped over the largest boulder, running on top of it a few split seconds before launching himself into the air again, this time flipping through the air like a professional acrobat to avoid the rest of the sudden rockslide.

As the head of the antlion robot got buried in the massively rocky assault, Sonic's feet touched ground, and the blue hedgehog was unscratched.

Suddenly, Sonic saw a glimpse of Robotnik in his aircraft flashing by and when the blue hedgehog turned around, he now saw that doctor was busy tending to his own heavily damaged robot rather than his organic hedgehog servant.

The doctor lifted his head and turned it to Sonic, explaining the situation.

"Apparently, this badnik of mine got a slight concussion by the seismic activity and got its CPU scrambled in the process. That's why it attacked you, hedgehog." Robotnik said.

Deciding to believe that explanation for the moment, Sonic was soon back on track for the next emerald.

But if he had taken the time to throw a glance at Robotnik's left arm, he would have noticed that the doctor had been folding it behind his back, with two of his hand's fingers crossed.

With a slight smile, Robotnik returned to the mechanical antlion, looking at a small screen that hadn't been cracked by the rockslide, showing some random statistics, which actually wasn't so random, such as a formula for the length of the all the individual bones in a certain blue hedgehog's body...

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**Author's Notes: **Three words. I-HATE-SCHOOL!

**To Ken Wise: **In the near future, Ken.

**To Snake15000: **It wouldn't be Eggman if he didn't, would it?

**To NUTCASE71733: **Which is exactly what I'm planning on.

**To N. Harmonik: **Hope that reaction was true to character enough.


	17. Chapter 15: Soaring Sky High

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 15: Soaring Sky High**

(THEME: Sky High Zone from Sonic 2, 8-bit.)

_**Act I**_

The white clouds on the sky and the lush greenery was a welcome change of scenery from the rather harsh and boiling environment of Robotnik's underground mining facility to the blue hedgehog, as his feet now traversed over an area covered in thick, green grass rather than red, hot lava.

Guided by the information of his highly despised allies, the badniks, Sonic had gotten to the highest point of South Island, the top of the mountain that in fact was the essential part of the whole island, which also once was the base of operations for Dr. Robotnik, during the time that there still were only six discovered chaos emeralds in jeopardy between the hedgehog's heroism and the doctor's plans for world domination.

How ironic. The last time Sonic was around these parts, he had foiled Robotnik's plans. Now, the blue hedgehog was helping him in the process of fulfilling those plans.

Sonic's thoughts were suddenly interrupted an incoming badnik attack from a strange and odd-looking robot.

The robot in question was an orange turtle-based droid that was cable of flight like the Turtloids before it. (**Author's Note**: A few chapters back, during the Sky Chase.) But unlike the heavily armed platforms, this one seemed slightly pathetic as it spun through the air like a runaway circular sawblade with its barely lethal curved edges, heading straight for Sonic.

Even though Sonic didn't completely buy the doctor's explanation that the antlion badnik had been malfunctioning (**Author's Note: **Don't you remember last chapter? Boy, and I thought I had the worst memory in mankind's history) it wouldn't surprise him if the doctor really was telling the truth if he had repeated that statement concerning this robotic daredevil...

------

With the overconfident turtle robot out of his way and in pieces, Sonic was free to explore the area for the second chaos emerald to hand over to Robotnik as ordered. But after running in circles a few times around the cloud-covered mountains, the young hedgehog found that he had to find an alternative way of passage, since not even he could search every last corner, cave and road of the fittingly named "Sky High Zone" without a few hundred years to spare.

But as he went higher up the mountain, Sonic found something that was exactly what the doctor recommended.

------

"YAHOO!" The blue hedgehog shouted as he threw himself from the steep cliff, and allowed his wings, albeit only temporary, to catch air and take flight across the aerial location off the Sky High Zone. The hang glider, the mechanical contraption constructed for temporary aerial thrills and altitude, which some adventurer probably had left behind to attend to some forgotten urgent meeting, safely carried the hedgehog trough the air.

The white fabric, decorated with a red, yellow and blue stripe that ran across it, strained slightly as the wind carried the hang-glider to new heights, where the clouds seemed slightly darker for some reason.

"_Looks like I'm running... No, __**flying **__into bad weather." _Sonic thought, unaware of true reasons that the clouds were getting thicker...

_**Act II**_

The raindrops were slowly forcing Sonic to land a bit earlier than planned, even though he had lost enough altitude to be unable to keep the glider up for more than a few seconds longer anyway. The blue hedgehog's sneaker-wearing feet touched ground by the heels, and he applied pressure to slow down, letting go of the glider as he skid through the wet ground.

A crack of lightning alerted Sonic, causing him to lose his balance and fall forwards, clumsily enough to slide the last few meters on his face in the mud. The blue hedgehog, pressed his hands against the ground to get him up, and his dirt-covered face slowly lift itself upwards. The hedgehog blinked a few times to get the mud out off his eyes, and coughed slightly to get it out of his mouth as well.

The hedgehog's eyes turned skywards towards the dark clouds that crackled with lightning once every minute, and what he saw made him drop his jaw so far that the remainder of the mud in it, rolled out and dripped from his lower lip to the ground beneath his face.

There, a few hundred meters up in the air, something that you could've confused with a distant star, if it hadn't been for the fact that it glowed like a nearby sun, floated effortlessly through the clouds, emitting sometimes sparks, sometimes bolts of energy. When Sonic realized what it the object really was, he concluded that it had to be the cause of the stormy weather in the first place.

It was the second of five chaos emeralds for Sonic to collect for Robotnik's schemes.

_**Act III**_

After having recovered another hang-glider that had been swept up in the small whirlwinds generated by the runaway chaos emerald and used the updraft to his advantage, Sonic had found it surprisingly easy to snatch the magic gem from the eye of the storm without any outburstsof raw energy on the emeralds part.

It was almost as if the emerald wanted him to find it. Could the mysterious gem be... willing to give itself to the hedgehog?

At first thought, that would have sounded crazy. An inanimate object can't express sentience, no matter how much power that was crammed into those rocks. But then again...

Remembering how the emeralds had responded when he was unable to stop Eggman's exo-suit despite his speed, strength and agility, imbuing him with just enough power to destroy the mecha, and then granting him limited invulnerability and flight when the Death Egg fell from the skies, Sonic found himself wondering if the thought really should be considered that crazy after having had such a first-hand experience with true power of the ancient gemstones. (**Author's Note: **A few chapters back, the debut of Super Sonic.)

With these thoughts in mind, and still soaring high up in the air by the strong currents, Sonic saw that with the "eye of the storm" gone, the dark clouds either whitened or faded away, leaving only a thick, but beautiful coat of a clouded cape that he passed over.

The winds also calmed down, and Sonic found that he was safely descending back towards Mobius once more. Preparing himself for the cold feeling of passing through the misleadingly fluffy clouds that actually were cold microscopic droplets of water...

... Sonic was slightly taken by surprise when his unprepared feet touched ground, and he stumbled forward through the mist as the wind still carrying the hang-glider forced the blue hedgehog out off balance.

To quit this joyride before he got a nasty bump on the head, Sonic let go off the hang-glider with his hands. The glider, with the sudden loss of weight, ascended somewhat, and left the hedgehog as he disappeared into the clouds...

A sharp metallic clang suddenly made itself heard, possibly from a blue hedgehog that hit something big, unseen by the white mist.

"_This must be the highest point of South Island." _Sonic's thoughts broke through the ringing in his head, as his silhouette straightened itself, only partially visible through the clouds.

A humming sound broke the silence, and somewhere in the cloudy surroundings, the blue hedgehog was suddenly on the alert of imminent danger.

"What the...?" Sonic's voice was heard...

The next second the hedgehog himself burst up from the mist, carried by a large, mechanical head of a gargantuan swan, courtesy of Robotnik's ingenious robotic design. The giant bird furiously threw the blue annoyance away with its beak, the hedgehog flipping back into hiding in the cloud coat.

The mechanical swan head, with its optical sensors useless in detecting the stealthy Sonic, opened a set of chambers in its long, metallic neck, and four smaller penguin-like bird drones were set loose to deal with locating the threat to their master's plans.

The tiny bird robots disappeared after the hedgehog into the mist, while the swan stayed behind, waving its head back and forth on its long neck, awaiting the penguin drones to return with the blue hedgehog for it to sink its large, steely beak into its flesh.

A set of small explosions was heard, matching all four of the drones sent out, but rather than fiery explosions, the clouds hid away the most, only showing small mushroom-shaped bulges in the white mist.

The swan head responded to the attack on its drones by opening its large beak wide and firing an orb of energy against the area where the drones had blown up, and the hot blast evaporated the cloud, revealing the naked ground beneath.

And only ground.

The swan head lent back and closed its beak, signing into its internal protocol that it's main objective of destroying the organic being known as Sonic the Hedgehog had been accomplished.

That's when Sonic choose to strike.

Having easily avoided the blast from the mechanical swan, the blue hedgehog burst up from his hiding place, and tossed himself towards the swan head, rolling into his spiky ball form in the jump. Before the robot swan could react, Sonic had worked his saw blade magic on the graceful neck, and the decapitated head fell to the ground with the hedgehog standing on the back end of the robot's body.

Sonic clapped the dust out of his hands, and then jumped off the body, running back to Mobius surface down the side of the mountain, leaving the heap of debris on the peak.

"_It was probably just another one of Robotnik's "malfunctioning" robots."_ Sonic sarcastically thought and kept running, focusing on locating the third emerald.

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**Author's Notes: **I can't blame it on Christmas or New Years anymore. Sorry for the late update, but I have fantastic news! My original character Virtus is on his way to becoming an official comic book character in Sweden! Sure, its not that much, but just think of the new ways this could work for in my favor! By the way, the Prologues and Epilogues for both The Beginning and Tale of Tails have had slight changes to fit with new Virtus continuity, just to let you know.

**To NUTCASE71733: **Yes, it kinda fleshes out the story for Game Gear Sonic 2, doesn't it?

**To N. Harmonik: **Why thank you. I'm quite proud of my ability to come up with my own ideas, while still retaining the original story elements.

**To Snake15000: **Just so he can have the pleasure of seeing Silver Sonic beat the original.


	18. Chapter 16: Aqua Lake

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

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**Chapter 16****: Aqua Lake**

(THEME: Aqua Lake Zone from Sonic 2, 8-bit.)

_**Act I**_

Sonic dashed through the area at high speed, crossing sections of the zone known as Aqua Lake in search for the third chaos emerald at a rapid pace, passing spectacularly designed fountains and very fortunate Crabmeats that weren't ordered to battle the hedgehog this time around.

Even though the hedgehog had a dislike for water because of his embarrassing inability to stay afloat, this wasn't his first encounter with the watery ruins that ran through most of South Island's underground caverns, and Sonic had learned a few tricks from his earlier visits. (**Author's Note: **Check the "Labyrinth Zone" in Sonic S: The Beginning, and "Aquatic Ruin" a few chapters back.)

Picking up enough speed, Sonic approached a wide body of water without any intent of slowing down. Then, when he ran out of footing to move his fast legs across, he jumped and spun into his trademark ball form.

Like a flat stone that's thrown from a horizontal angle onto a body of water's surface, the hedgehog bounced along the water, moving too fast for gravity to react on the speedy extra weight that only teased the tension of the surface before it had gotten to firm footing at the other side.

Sonic kept doing this every time he had to traverse a body of water, and had soon searched the entire ground level of the Aqua Lake. However, Sonic's search above water proved fruitless in the hunt for the magical gems, and no matter how much he disliked it, the young hedgehog would have to go underwater if he would have any chance of saving his newly established friend Tails from Robotnik's claws.

Looking for the next large body of water, Sonic drew in a deep breath, performed a surprisingly perfect dive for someone who couldn't swim at all, and splashed his way into the depths of the Aqua Lake...

_**Act II**_

The underground caverns were just as wet as Sonic had predicted, and the blue hedgehog was like always blessed with luck when the air bubbles seeped up from the submerged floors with the much anticipated oxygen for Sonic to fill his desperate lungs with.

The blue hedgehog, albeit submerged, managed to take himself deeper and deeper into the submerged ruins with relative ease, especially with a set of lobster robots of Robotnik's brand that paid no attention to Sonic, even though they would have had the upper hand at this home plane of theirs.

---

Sonic's voyage came to a sudden halt when he found himself in a completely water-filled chamber that also was a dead-end, with no possible way out but to turn around and try a different route. But the hedgehog choose to stay rather go all the way back, and looked up to see that the chamber actually only was the bottom of a vertical tunnel to the surface.

But even though the way out was near, the blue hedgehog found that he had no way of using it. Even though he could jump pretty high, which became even higher under water due to the lighter grip of gravity, it still was too slippery for his feet and hands to work their way upwards through the vertical tunnel.

Feeling the need to refresh his oxygen supply, Sonic looked around and found that his luck hadn't given up on him when a large gaping hole released a cascade of bubbles, even twice as large as the ones he was used to breathing in.

The blue hedgehog slowly made his way towards the stream of bubbles, closed his eyes in anticipation, edged his mouth closer...

... And suddenly found that all his surroundings had gotten dryer. Surprised at the sudden lack of wetness around his soaked furry body, Sonic opened his eyes in surprise.

Rather than having been absorbed into his lungs for breathing, the super sized bubble had enveloped the blue hedgehog in its soapy embrace, and Sonic found that he now was able to breathe more normally. Judging by the size of the bubble, Sonic concluded that it could sustain him for at least a few minutes before the gas inside it had been converted into unbreathable air by the hedgehog's lungs.

More good news came in the form of Sonic realizing that the bubble was carrying him, keeping him moving upwards through the shaft. The hedgehog couldn't help but smile at this turn of events and carefully sat back in the bubble, carefully so that his quills wouldn't pop it...

_**Act III**_

In a massive burst of water that welled up from the underground, Sonic reached the surface through a geyser crater, was sent high into the air, flipped a few times, and finally made a perfect landing on the ground as the mist and droplets of water fell around his feet.

Panting slightly, inhaling rich oxygen, Sonic looked at his tightly closed fist and opened it to reveal the third chaos emerald, this one being the blue one of the pack. This one had caused him some serious trouble, hiding away in an underwater maze similar to the Labyrinth Zone a few months back... (**Author's Note: **Check previous note...)

Sonic shook his head remembering things from old months passed, knowing that now wasn't the time for flashbacks, but the time to focus on tasks at hand. So the blue hedgehog put the mystical gem into the exotic hiding place between the azure quills on his back and sped off over the watery zones of the Aqua Lake.

---

And at the end of the zone, there was yet another robot of the Robotnik brand. Sonic screeched to a halt, tearing of some microscopic rubber particles from his soles in the process and looked up at Robotnik's next mechanic masterpiece.

This one, supposedly given the looks of its master facial features, right down to the large nose and the glasses, looked like a robotic seal, but the metallic whiskers that was one of the characteristics of Dr. Robotnik somehow gave this particular badnik the appearance of a walrus.

"So you're the one I'm supposed to do the transactions with? The bad egg couldn't make it, so he sent some spoiled fishfood instead?" Sonic taunted.

The robotic walrus remained emotionless, just as it was programmed to.

With no reply or movement whatsoever coming from the badnik, Sonic stretched into the sea of quills on his back and plucked out the blue chaos emerald from its perfect camouflage spot and held it in front of him for the robot to see.

That was the sign the robot had been waiting for, once its internal sensors confirmed that the gem that blue hedgehog was holding indeed was a chaos emerald.

The large nose of Robotnik's trademark that the artificial walrus had in its face suddenly bloated up like a swollen red balloon. Sonic grew suspicious (and perhaps a bit gigglish) as the nose grew through the insane proportions of a basketball, a melon, and finally reached the size where it outmatched the rest of the walrus's body.

That's when the badnik apparently concluded that its nosepiece had been loaded with enough explosives to send its intended target to kingdom come, and hurled its weapon towards the blue hedgehog in question.

The explosion shook a large portion of the Aqua Lake, and once the smoke and fire had cleared, there was nothing left but falling pieces of debris and some evaporated water putting a cloak of mist all over the area.

But before the content walrus-robot could put "Sonic the Hedgehog" on its list of successfully terminated targets, a voice broke through the vapour.

"Bless you!"

A Sonic-shaped shadow in ball form cut through the mechanical walrus like the dental drill of kid's nightmares, and then disappeared once more in the mist that had clogged the badnik's sensors in the first place. And the explosion of the destroyed robotic walrus cleared away the remaining fog, once again making the beautiful view of Aqua Lake visible to the world...

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**Author's Notes: **Read 'em and weep, boys! You're looking at an official comic book writer! X3 Well, at least in Sweden... Sorry for the late update, but various things kept getting in the way. School work, art jams, writing... etc. Well, I have returned, so keep the bricks (and reviews) coming! XD

Please review, but no flames! Me no likey flames! XD

**To NUTCASE71733:**Indeed it did. More data to give to Silver Sonic behind the scenes to destroy the blue hedgehog! MUHAHAHA!

**To N. Harmonik: **Well, it's just an origin comic so far, aiming for a release date in Summer 2008, and remember that Virtus is a human. (In the updated prolouges and epilouges too)

**To Snake15000: **A common gesture of supervillains... XD

**To Tutis 75: **Thanks for the fav!


	19. Chapter 17: Return to Green Hill

**Sonic S: ****The Tale of Tails**

_Written by Virtus the Protector_

_Starring characters copyright of Virtus the Protector, Sega and Archie Comics, used without permission by the two later._

--

**Chapter 17****: Return to Green Hill**

(THEME: Green Hills Zone from Sonic 2, 8-bit.)

_**Act I**_

The blue hedgehog known as Sonic didn't expect to return to this part of South Island so soon. As his speedy feet made the road down the checkered hillsides and the grassy fields of the Green Hill, his thoughts went back a few months in time, to the very beginning of his journey in his first search for the chaos emeralds…

--

_Sonic reacted just in time to avoid the giant boulder as it slammed into the ground where he was standing a second earlier. He looked up to find the source of the round checkered stone at the end of a thick chain, which was none other than the big troublemaker himself, whose egg-shape resided in his half-orb shaped flying vehicle._

"_Robotnik…" __Sonic thought upon facing the doctor for the first time._

"_What an eggman!"__ He smirked and got ready for the obese doctor's challenge._

_Sonic jumped to a higher platform and then threw himself against the cockpit of Robotnik's aircraft, rolling into a spiky ball in the process. The heavier built vehicle didn't budge as easily as the little robots had, but the blue hedgehog's attack had left a mark as he bounced back to the platform he started on._

"_Why you…!" __Robotnik angrily thought and pulled the deadly pendulum out off the ground to mash the irritating hedgehog into a blue, spiky pancake. Sonic easily dodged the boulder, and delivered another blow to the cargo while he was at it._

_This process repeated itself a few times. Robotnik would throw his pendulum at the quick hedgehog, and Sonic would prove fast enough, not only to avoid the pendulum, but also to throw a kick or two at the now badly damaged aircraft._

_After four more kicks, Robotnik's flying vehicle began to shake uncontrollably while spouting smoke, fire and oil. The pendulum detached itself from the aircraft and cracked into a million pieces. The humiliated doctor mumbled some words at the cursed hedgehog before blasting off on a shaky ride._

_The hedgehog looked after Robotnik proudly for a few seconds, and then headed for the Bridge Zone to settle the score there as well._

--

_**Act II**_

Things had been different back then. It's very surprising how much things can change in such short time, even for a speedster such as the blue hedgehog Sonic. Back then, he only wished to gather the emeralds to ensure that Mobius wouldn't have to bow down to a new self-acclaimed ruler, Dr. Robotnik. Now, in an ironic twist of fate, he was instead collecting them to ensure that the very same villain could give total world domination another try. All for the sake of Miles Prower's, AKA Tails', wellbeing.

Like one of the mindless drones in Robotnik's private army, Sonic didn't really have any reason to enjoy the lush greenery of the surroundings, being busy turning everything upside-down in search for the fourth emerald. And the difference between organic and robot seemed inexistent, as the blue blur suddenly found himself at the end of the zone once he went out of his "auto-pilot" mode…

--

_**Act III**_

Only now did he take in mind that it was the yellow one, somehow having previously missed that insignificant, still obvious detail.

"I guess that I let myself get a bit carried away…"But as the young hedgehog looked down, he smirked at his feet, now in the unusual standstill position.

"I take that back. I guess that I let **you two **carry me away!"

But before he could snicker at his clever pun of words, the blue hedgehog felt the ground shake and looked up from his feet to come face-to-fac… Oops, sorry, face-to-giant-metallic stomach, as the latest cliché-like appearance of another new, "malfunctioning" badnik, this one a enormous robot pig who obviously never had heard about the code of honour and peaceful co-existence of the ancient art of sumo wrestling, instead having learned everything from the wrestling videos in its master's private collection when he wasn't looking…

But before we dwell too deeply into the depths of Dr. Robotnik's hobbies and lose ourselves to an uninteresting story of his film tastes and habits, let's get back to the action, shall we?

The large robotic pig stomped a few times, unintentionally tipping its intended target off about its next move, which was following its protocol to the letter, planning to mash the blue hedgehog into pulp, which easily could have been done by the sheer use of its tremendous mass and weight alone.

But of course, the good ole doctor had to overdo it, which was Sonic's thoughts exactly about the whole ordeal, at least when the sumo robot rolled into a large compact ball, similar to the blue hedgehog's own spin dash, but much less sleek and much more clunkier.

The size off the armoured orb of destruction betrayed Sonic's better judgement, and the young hedgehog was caught off-guard when the sumo robot rolled at a surprisingly remarkable speed towards him, preparing to crush the hedgehog's face to the ground.

Nevertheless, it was still very slow by Sonic the Hedgehog's standards. Sonic easily dodged the assault, and jumped into the air as a blue spiky ball, just in time for the sumo pigbot to break out of its rolling mode to come back at the hedgehog from another angle.

But the young hedgehog had already grown tired of his much larger and clumsier opponent's ridiculous attempts at catching him, and decided to end things now and get this irritating obstacle of his path once and for all.

A few seconds later, all that was left of the sumo robot was the pile of an as of yet unnamed metallic-pork dish, courtesy of the amateur chief Sonic the Hedgehog, walking while juggling his latest chaos emerald in his gloved hand...

--

**Author's Notes: **Back again! Sorry for the late update and poorly choreographed action scenes. I'll see if I can give something tastier next time.

**To N.Harmonik: **At this point, there's only a Swedish version in planning. But we'll see what the future holds, if I ever can get Virtus onto the international market.

**To Snake15000: **And more to go.

**To NUTCASE71733: **Indeed. But they were still quite hard without rings…


	20. The Author's Apologies

**THE AUTHOR'S SINCEREST APOLOGIES**

Before I move on, I want to thank each and everyone of you whom has reviewed and commented on my Sonic series fan-fics. Sadly, however, I now have a job as an original writer, and I have no time to finish this fan-fic series. I know some of you may be disappointed, but I've made my decision, and I want to focus on something serious.

If anyone wants to continue this story from where I left it, I'm willing to submit my account details to anyone who wishes to do so.


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